Extra Curriculars Anthology
Author: riadsala; shoemaster; beatperfume
Date: 2011-02-21T05:00:00+00:00
Keywords: hrpf; FanFiction; Alternate Universe - High School; Chicago Blackhawks; F/M; M/M; Hockey RPF; Andrew Ladd; Brent Seabrook; Duncan Keith; Patrick Sharp; Troy Brouwer; Brent Seabrook/OFC; Duncan Keith/Brent Seabrook; College AU; Ryan Kesler; Andrew Ladd/Ryan Kesler; Alexandre Burrows; Ryan Kesler/Andrew Ladd; Alternate Universe; Voyeurism; Brent Seabrook/Original Female Character; Completed; Anthology
Description: Anthology containing: Extra Curriculars by riadsala & shoemaster Nothing Worth Knowing by beatperfume & shoemaster The One About the Appendix by beatperfume Hide It Well by shoemaster
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Rights: Copyrights as per source stories

Extra Curriculars by riadsala, shoemaster

Series: Extra Curriculars [1]
Fandoms: Hockey RPF
AO3 Categories: F/M, M/M
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Relationships: Brent Seabrook/OFC, Duncan Keith/Brent Seabrook
Characters: Andrew Ladd, Brent Seabrook, Duncan Keith, Patrick Sharp, Troy Brouwer
Freeform Tags: Alternate Universe - High School, Chicago Blackhawks
Status: Completed
Chapters: 1
Words: 31,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Published: 2011-02-21
Updated: 2011-02-21
Packaged: 2023-12-04 17:14:45
Summary:

According to every TV show Brent’s ever seen, every school has a guy like Duncan Keith: the weird outcast who wears all black and listens to metal. High School AU.

Extra Curriculars

Author’s Note:

Not only is this a ‘they’re all the same age and went to the same high school’ AU, this is a ‘we completely disregarded the existence of Junior level hockey for our own fun and profit’ AU. And by profit, we mean porn.

Thanks to beatperfume for the beta!

According to every TV show Brent’s ever seen, every school has a guy like Duncan Keith: the weird outcast who wears all black and listens to metal. But the thing is, there wasn’t anyone like that at Delta before Keith transferred in at the start of junior year. Brent figures switching high schools then is going to be tough no matter what, but Keith really didn’t help matters when the first presentation he gave — the most words anyone had heard him say at that point — was on some messed up serial killer.

And as far as he can remember, on TV the weird outcast guy usually isn’t one of the best hockey players in the region. Not the best though. The best players are on Brent’s team, but the Lancers aren’t too bad.

He’s in Brent’s history class, but he sits by himself and listens to his headphones way too loud any time the teacher’s not talking. No one really talks to him and the guys on the Vipers all lost interest when he stayed with his own team, even after moving here.

When Brent gets assigned to work with Keith for their big class project, he’s not thrilled. Troy and Ladd and Fraser are in the class with him, why couldn’t he get one of them? Sure, he and Ladd don’t usually get a lot of work done when they work together, but that doesn’t mean he’d rather work with Keith. To be fair, Keith hasn’t actually given him a reason to think he’s anything worse than a loner weirdo, so Brent figures it will probably be fine. He still feels a little bit lame tapping him on the shoulder to get his attention before he goes stalking off down the hall after class

Keith just removes one headphone and — wow, yeah, that’s loud — and gives Brent a “what?” look.

“So we should probably trade like, email addresses or whatever for the project. I mean, I don’t know what your practice schedule is like, but it’s probably crazy like ours is and-”

“Yeah, okay,” Keith says.

“Oh, right, yeah.” Brent starts digging in his bag for a pen and a piece of paper he’s not going to have to turn in eventually. He feels kind of like an idiot, which is stupid, because exchanging emails is a totally legitimate thing to be doing right now.

Keith scrawls his on the back of what turns out to be a show flier for a band with way too many skulls on its logo and is out of the classroom almost before Brent can say thanks.

He could email Keith during study hall, but decides to wait until he gets home, which isn’t til like, eight because he has practice and then a bunch of them grab a bite to eat before Ladd drops him off at home.

He stares at the blinking cursor for a few minutes before sending off a “hey, this is my email address. -seabs”

He doesn’t really know what he was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t a reply two minutes later saying, “saturday at 5?”

His game is at 10am on Saturday, so he’ll be free that afternoon. Maybe they’ll be done early enough that he can even hang out with the guys after.

“cool. wanna meet at the library? - seabs”

“okay.”

And that’s pretty much that. Except Brent ends up googling the band that’s on the flier and listening to like, a song before turning it off. He really doesn’t get that stuff.

He puts on some Brooks & Dunn and reads the 30 pages of Margaret Atwood his English teacher assigned in between IMing Brouwer and Ladd.

The rest of the week passes with the two of them exchanging awkward “we know each other but we aren’t friends” head nods, and when Saturday rolls around Brent is determined to get in and out of there as fast as possible.

For once, Keith doesn’t have his headphones in, and is apparently trying to scratch designs into the side of his pencil with a ball point pen.  He stops as soon as Brent walks up though, and pulls out the assignment sheet they were given.

“Straight to work, eh?” Brent says. “Got plans for later?”

“Not being in the library on a Saturday night?” Keith says.

“Yeah, fair point. Your team’s probably got a party thing going too, huh?”

Keith just shrugs, and Brent isn’t sure if that’s a negative or an affirmative. “I think we should do Franklin’s fuck up in the arctic,” he says. “There are a lot of books about it.”

“Yeah, sure,” Brent says. “Did they eat each other? Or was that only the Donner Party?”

“Yeah, I think some of them did. Before they all froze to death.”

Brent grimaces and scratches under his neck. “Gross. Here, I’ll go search the catalog and then we can go find the ones that look useful.”

Keith just stares at him, worrying his pen against his lip.

“Um, unless you want to do the searching?”

“What? No, yeah, that’s cool. I’ll go, uh, start looking.” And with that he gets up and heads toward the non fiction stacks.

Brent scribbles down some call numbers but when he goes to pull them, Keith’s holding half of them already. “You read my mind,” Brent says, showing him the list.

Keith just sort of shrugs.

Right. “So this should be enough book sources, and I guess I’ll look online tomorrow.”

“Cool,” Keith says.

There’s an awkward silence after they divvy up the books so Brent asks, “Did you guys play today?”

“Yeah.”

Brent is about to give this whole “conversation” thing up as a lost cause, because seriously? But after a pause Keith continues.

“We got creamed by Abbotsford.”

“Ouch. We played them in an invitational last year. Do they still have that guy on wing who’s like, 8 feet tall?”

“He looks like he’s 23,” Keith says.

“Right? What do they feed them out there?” Brent asks. “But oh man, when he goes down, he goes down hard.”

Keith’s mouth twitches — it’s almost like a smile.

“We almost got beat by Kelowna, which would’ve been awful, but Ladder pulled this ridiculous deke move and got the game winner,” Brent says. “He says we have to bring his share of the beer tonight, but I think that’s bullshit, cause I’ve got a bruise right here,” he stands and points to a spot high on his thigh, “from blocking a shot. That deserves at least a pair, right?”

But Keith is apparently back to his silent staring thing, so Brent has no choice but to sit back down and get to work.

“Does it look cool?” Keith asks after a minute.

“What?”

“Your bruise.”

“Oh, right. I mean, it was already purple after the game, so it’s probably gonna be around for a while. Hurts like a son of a bitch.”

“Then yeah, definitely a two beer bruise.”

“See! Dmen have each other’s backs. You should come tonight, be my back up.”

“What?” Keith asks.

“I mean, if you don’t have other plans. Fraz is hosting, and you might get pumped for like, a scouting report or whatever, but it’d be cool.”

“I’m not really big on like, parties and stuff. And won’t your friends be mad that you’re bringing the weirdo to the party?”

“No one thinks you’re a weirdo,” Brent says automatically, even though yeah, most people do.

Keith just raises his eyebrow.

“It’s not like it’s going to be a rager. Everyone there is cool, they’ll be cool. And some people think you’re kind of strange because you don’t hang out with anyone at school. So come hang out.”

Keith still looks skeptical.

“It’s not like you’ll be stuck there all night if it sucks, which it won’t.”

Keith hesitates another moment, but eventually he kind of shrugs and relaxes. “Well, I guess if there’s gonna be free beer.”

Brent grins. “Can’t argue with that. I’ll email you Fraz’s address and you can google map it. It’s not that far.”

“If it totally blows, you’re writing my half of the report.”

“If you really want a C that badly,” Brent says, grinning.

He gets to Fraz’s earlier than he would normally, because he doesn’t want Keith showing up before him. That’s not really an issue, because Keith doesn’t show up for another hour.

It’s kind of obvious when he does finally arrive. There are a few confused murmurs that make Brent turn to the door. “Hey! You made it!”

Keith looks really uncomfortable standing in the foyer, so Brent grabs a beer and heads right over. Keith has changed out of the black band t-shirt he was wearing and into another shirt that, while still black, is long sleeved and considerably tighter. “Thought you might be standing me up.”

Keith takes the beer and pops the tab one handed, a skill Brent is totally jealous of, because he always ends up dropping the beer on his foot when he tries. “Come on, I’ll show you around.”

It’s a little awkward the way everybody nods when Brent says “You guys know Keith, right?” because it’s really obvious that it’s the nod of, “I recognize the school weirdo”.

But Brent powers through, and once they start talking hockey things start going pretty well. Keith’s still not really smiling, but he’s talking, so he’s not having an awful time.

“No, you owe me two beers, Laddy, it was your turnover. And look at this bruise!” Brent is a little drunk, so dropping his pants and lifting the edge of his boxers to show off the mottled purple bruise on his thigh seems like a great idea.

And then a girl squeals, “Duncs!” and comes running over to hug Keith. Suddenly Brent feels very awkward about his jeans around his ankles.

“Erica? What are you doing here?” Keith asks, even as he’s hugging her. “Does Kaner know you’re here?”

She just waves him off. “He’s at home playing video games like a dork.”

Keith is giving the guy Erica came with — a basketball player from their school — a dirty look.

Brent picks up his pants as casually as possible.

Of course, casually as possible for a drunk Brent still includes losing his balance and falling into the arm of the couch. And so naturally that’s when Erica turns her attention from Keith to the rest of the group.

“Charming the pants off the boys at your new school too, Duncs?” she giggles. Keith blushes and mutters something insulting into his beer.

“Sorry, we haven’t met,” Brent says, holding out his hand once he’s shimmied back into his pants and ignores the way that Laddy is totally laughing at him. “I’m Brent Seabrook. How do you know Duncs?”

It’s the first time he’s used the nickname, but he never knew Keith even had a nickname. He likes it.

“Erica Kane,” she says, shaking his. “Duncs and my brother Pat have played hockey together for forever.”

“No shit,” Brent says. “Wait. You’re Patrick Kane’s sister? How does a little dweeb like that- I mean. Uh. I see you stole all the pretty from the gene pool.” He grins charmingly, like maybe everyone will forget he insulted her brother.

Erica laughs and Keith snorts. “He traded it in for athletic skill.”

“Not everyone can be as blessed as some of us,” Brent says, shrugging.

She just laughs at him, and turns back to Keith. “I’ll see you at the next game, okay? And I’ll tell Pat I saw you.”

She heads back over to her basketball players and Brent stares at Duncs. “Come on dude, next time give me some warning if a hot chick is going to show up while I’ve got my pants down.”

“I think maybe you’re missing the point of taking off your pants,” Duncs says dryly.

“I like to think I have a little more game than that,” Brent says.

“Oh please,” says Fraser, coming up and throwing an arm around Brent’s shoulders. “Like you have any game at all. When’s the last time you even got a girl’s number?”

“Two months ago, the opposing goalie’s sister,” Ladd offers.

“Thank you,” Brent laughs and then shoves at Fraz. “Besides, your mom gave me plenty of numbers last night, dude.”

“That doesn’t even make any sense!” Fraser shoves him back and they both go careening into Keith, who manages to steady them both and not even spill his beer in the process.

“Look at this guy,” Brent grins. “He’s got skills all over the place.”

“Yeah, he skilled me onto my ass last year,” Fraz says.

Duncs takes a sip of his beer, but Brent thinks he’s just trying to hide his smile. “You were in the crease.”

Fraz snorts, but Brent is kind of in awe. “Shit man, you’re like Dirty Harry of the blue line. Do you feel lucky, punk?”

He’s still standing really close to Duncs. He should probably take a step back, but he doesn’t feel like it.

“I’m glad you’re my partner, man,” he says, tapping Duncs’s chest. “for our project. You’re a pretty cool dude.”

Duncs snorts. “You’re pretty bitchin’ yourself, brah.”

“Dude, shut up, you know what I mean. It’s nice that you’re not just the weird goth kid anymore.”

“I’m not goth,” Duncs says.

“You’re the closest thing this school has to it,” Brent says, waving off the semantics. “I know people were kind of dicks at first, so I can’t blame you for trying to drown us all out with the headphones.”

“Thanks?” Duncs says.

“I need another beer, come on,” Brent says.

He tugs Duncs in the direction of the kitchen. “You need another one too?”

“No, I’m good, I have to drive home eventually. Thanks, though.”

Brent smiles and opens the fridge. “See? Coming here wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“I guess not,” Duncs shrugs.

“You guess not?” Brent asks. “Fine, next weekend you can show me what you do for fun.”

“Uh, I was going to see Bloodscrye at The Garage next weekend. I don’t- that’s probably not your thing.”

“Oh. Yeah, I don’t know them really. But you should always try new things, right?”

“Wait, really? You’d want to come?”

“I mean, unless you don’t want me to? It’s only fair.” Drunk logic is so clear and simple.

“No, I mean yeah. You don’t have to.”

“I have black clothes,” Brent offers. “I can blend!”

Duncs looks skeptical and laughs, but he says, “Okay, if you want.”

“Cool,” Brent says, grinning and slapping Duncs’s shoulder.

“You’re a real friendly drunk, huh,” Duncs says, looking a little bemused.

“I’m friendly all the time!” Brent protests. He’s totally a friendly guy. Duncs just laughs again and leans up against the counter.

“Yeah, I guess you are.”

The rest of the party goes well. Duncs is quiet, but he joins in on conversations and doesn’t look like he’s dying to get out of there.

Brent likes having him around.

“I should get going,” Duncs says, pulling out his car keys.

“Are you good to drive?” Brent asks. He’s a very responsible drunk. “There’s plenty of crash space.”

“I stopped drinking an hour ago,” Duncs says. “I’m fine. Did you need a ride home?”

“I’m crashing here,” Brent says. “The folks wouldn’t appreciate me stumbling in, you know?” It’s a tempting offer though, which is kind of weird.

“Okay, cool,” Duncs says. “I guess I’ll see you in history then.”

“Awesome,” Brent says, and on impulse grabs Duncs around the shoulders and pulls him in for a hug. Duncs seems surprised for a second, but eventually his arms come around Brent’s back. He’s got very nice shoulders, Brent thinks absently.

When he gets home the next afternoon, there’s an email from Duncs, with a bunch of links for their history project.

“did you sleep at all last nite?” Brent replies.

“yeah. Just didn’t have to nurse a hangover this morning.”

“touche”

They continue emailing back and forth all afternoon, occasionally talking about their project, but mostly about their hockey teams and classmates and Duncs’s old school and things. Duncs emails him in all caps occasionally to ask if his hangover is any better and Brent googles around for the cheesiest death metal bands he can find, and sends the links to Duncs asking if they’re his favorite band ever.

When Brent’s mom calls him down for dinner, he’s shocked that it’s time already. “gotta go, dude, dinner’s ready. i can totally count this all as homework time right? see you tomorrow bro”

Duncs is already at his desk when Brent gets to history, headphones on and blasting. So Brent kicks his foot as he walks by to take the desk next to him.

Duncs looks up from his notebook then and removes one headphone. It’s a banner day. “Hey.”

“Hey,” Brent says. “What’s up?”

Duncs shrugs.

Right. Brent tries to think of something else to say, but the bell rings and he has to actually like, pay attention to class.

Well, he half pays attention to class, he half watches Duncs out of the corner of his eye. He can’t tell if the guy is actually taking notes or just doodling.

He divides his attention between Duncs and Mrs. Holtzapple until he glances over one time and sees Duncs staring back at him. It’s not really a thing that should make him blush, but apparently his face didn’t get that message. He tries for a casual hand wave, but Mrs. Holtzapple apparently mistakes that for him raising his hand and he has to scramble to come up with a factor for the decline of the fur trade.

“Uh, over trapping?” he says.

He just knows Duncs is laughing at him. To be fair, so are Troy and Ladd behind him. His friends are all assholes.
“That was one factor in the decline of the populations of furred animals. What was the other?”

Brent is shooting Duncs a dirty look, but he’s tapping his pencil fake casual against the notebook page closest to Brent.

“Clearing the land for settlements?” Brent reads.

“Very good Brent,” she says. “And you too, Duncan.”

Duncs slips down in his chair and goes back to taking notes and ignoring Brent for the rest of the period.
Brent tries to catch him after class, but he’s headphoned up and out the door before Brent can even put his books away. He heads straight to the parking lot after school though, and manages to catch Duncs heading toward an older black pickup truck.

“Hey, Duncs,” he calls out, jogging up to him, but now that he’s caught up he doesn’t know quite what he wants to say. “Thanks for helping me out in history. Sorry you got called out.”

Duncs shrugs and slings his backpack into the bed of the truck. “Not my fault I know more about the fur trade than you, Seabrook.”

“Hey, I know plenty about beavers thank you very much!” he says without thinking, then has to laugh at what he just said. Duncs is definitely trying to hide a smile.

“So I’ve got like an hour to kill before practice and was going to head to Timmy’s…” Brent says, leaving the invitation unspoken.

“I’ve got practice out in Langley,” Duncs says.

“Oh! Right,” Brent says, rocking back on his heels. “Well you better get going then, eh?”

“Yeah,” Duncs says, rolling his keys in his hand.

“Well, have fun. And oh, tell Kaner he has no business having a sister that hot.”

“I will, but you can’t blame me when he’s sitting outside your house with a baseball bat every night.” Duncs opens the door to his truck and climbs in.

“Please, I could take that pee-wee no problem,” Brent scoffs. He waves Duncs off and tries to remember where he left his own car. Maybe if he’s lucky he’ll get the cashier who always gives him an extra donut in his order.

The rest of the week goes pretty much the same. Duncs isn’t suddenly his bff, but he talks a little more to Brent and his friends.

The Vipers beat North Vancouver on Friday night and afterward he crashes at Ladd’s and they stay up way too late playing Call of Duty because he’s got the whole weekend free. Well, free for homework and working out. And going to see that band with Duncs. He has to google the venue to figure out how to spell the band’s name.

It’s really not his thing, but he hopes that with repetition he won’t look quite so pained when he hears it live.

The venue website also gives him a pretty good idea of how he should dress if he doesn’t want to stick out like a sore thumb. He’s got a pair of ripped jeans and a black shirt. It’s a little too small, but it’s the only one he’s got.

Duncs looks surprised when he swings by Brent’s house to pick him up.

“What? I told you I could blend,” Brent says, crossing his arms over his chest.

Duncs clears his throat. “Sorry I doubted you.” He goes to take off the parking break but pauses, and fumbles with one of the leather cuffs around his wrist. He tosses it to Brent. “Now you’ll really blend.”

They get to the venue and buy their tickets, and the whole time all Brent can think about is the cuff around his wrist: how it’s making him itch a little, and how he secretly thinks it makes him look a little badass, and how it used to be around Duncs’s wrist. Once they get inside he’s quite content to stand along the wall and people watch, but Duncs continues down into the cluster of people in the pit, and Brent doesn’t really want to lose sight of the only person he knows here.

Down in the pit people are talking and jostling each other, waiting for the band to go on. Brent stands there awkwardly, rubbing his fingers over the buckle of the cuff.

“So do you like, go to a lot of shows?” he asks. Duncs nods, kicking away an empty water bottle on the floor.

“Some. There’re games a lot of the time, but you know, when I can.”

Brent nods, “Yeah, I had to miss the Brad Paisley show when it came to town because we had a tournament.”

“Are you sure you want to be in the pit?” Duncs asks. “It can get a little out of control.”

Brent stands up straight and looks down at Duncs. “I think I can handle it. I play hockey.  Is this because of the country music thing? Because those can get pretty wild too.”

Duncs shakes his head just as the lights go down. The crowd sends up a cheer and surges forward. The band starts playing and it’s almost worse live. It’s definitely louder.  But Brent doesn’t have much time to be a music critic, because some dude just crashed into him.

“Hey man, watch it,” Brent says. The music drowns him out, and as he looks around he sees he’s one of the few not throwing himself around and crashing into people. Even Duncs has joined a circle of guys bouncing off each other.

He edges toward the side a little, because he figures that’ll be safer, but it turns out the sides are where people end up when they get violently tossed out of the center. He starts bouncing around and throwing his shoulders into guys just for self-preservation. He’s starting to think he’s getting a hang of it and glances over at Duncs to show him how not out of his element he is. He’s just in time to see a guy straight up launch himself over a knot of people and land squarely on Duncs’s back, knocking him face first into the ground. The guy gets up and bounces off like it’s nothing, but Duncs only pushes himself up onto his hands and knees, shaking his head.

“Duncs!” Brent yells, elbowing guys indiscriminately as he pushes his way toward him. A couple guys are helping him up and stopping other guys from moshing too close. “Dude, are you okay?” he asks, sliding his shoulder under Duncs’s arm as the other guys go back to dancing.

“Ib find,” Duncs says.

“Bullshit,” Brent says, dragging them out of the pit. “Your nose is bleeding.”

“Only a liddle,” Duncs argues.

“Yeah, so it’s probably not broken,” Brent says, rolling his eyes. “It’s still bleeding.”

“Just ged me sub napkins,” Duncs says rolling his eyes back at Brent.

He does, and he goes to hold them against Duncs’s bloody nose himself, but Duncs takes them out of his hand at the last second.

“You tink Ib crazy dow, don’t you,” Duncs says.

“Uh, kind of?” Brent replies. He thinks he sees Duncs frown, but it’s kind of hard to tell behind all the bloody paper. “But it was also kind of fun. I saw one guy just straight up punch another dude.”

“Yeah, sub guys ged indo it preddy hardcore.”

Brent watches a trickle of blood make its way down Duncs’s chin. “Do you wanna go wash that blood off your face? I always hate how itchy it gets when it dries.”

Duncs nods in agreement and heads toward the back of the club. Brent follows behind, wondering what kind of bathroom a place like this even has. Turns out one with black painted walls almost entirely obscured by band fliers and stickers, and a bare lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. There are two rusty urinals and a cracked porcelain sink, the latter of which Duncs heads straight for, tossing the bloody napkins and splashing his face. The two other dudes already in there ignore them both. Brent grabs a handful of paper towels from the dispenser and hands them to Duncs once he’s got most of the blood off his face.

“Thanks,” Duncs says, wiping his face and twitching his nose. “I think I’m ready to go back out there.”

“Seriously?” Brent asks. “What if you get hit in the face?”

“I’ll mop up the blood?” Duncs shrugs. “I’m a hockey player, remember?”

Brent huffs. “Fine. But it’s your face you’ll be ruining.”

Duncs looks at him weird when he says that, but pushes the door bathroom door open. “Come on.”

Brent actually gets kind of into it, moshing around with all the other dudes. Sometimes he and Duncs crash into each other and Duncs will slap him on the shoulder.  He totally keeps an eye on Duncs when they’re not bouncing off each other, in case he goes down again.  Unfortunately, he probably should’ve been keeping that eye on the rest of the crowd, because he might’ve seen that dude’s fist coming in time to duck.

Which is how they find themselves back where they were half an hour ago, just with their positions reversed. Brent clutches his face. He can already tell he’s going to have an awesome black eye tomorrow, which will be fun to explain to his mom. Duncs hands him a stack of napkins and puts a hand on his shoulder, ducking his head to get a look at Brent’s face.

“Doesn’t look like anything’s broken,” he says. “If you wanna get out of here, we can go.”

“Your band’s dot done playing,” Brent protests.

“I think we’ve taken enough damage for tonight,” Duncs replies.

“Are you sure?” Brent asks.

“Yeah, come on, we can go get something to eat,” Duncs says, wiping the last smear of blood off Brent’s face.

“Is there anywhere around here that won’t take one look at us and kick us out?” Brent asks.  There’s a wet spot on his shirt that’s probably blood but the fabric is too dark to tell, and a few splatters on his jeans, too. He doesn’t even know whose blood it is.

“A few places,” Duncs shrugs.

“There was definitely more crowd participation than at that Keith Urban concert I went to,” Brent says. “Unless you count the women throwing bras and panties on stage.”

“I’m not sure there are a whole lot of bras in here to throw,” Duncs says, glancing around.

The air outside the club is cool compared to the sweaty mess inside, and it feels good against Brent’s swollen face. Duncs leads him into a shabby-looking burger joint down the street, and an incredibly bored waitress seats them in a far corner.

“Their blue cheese burger is pretty decent,” Duncs says as he passes a menu over to Brent.

“Wow, I wouldn’t have thought a place like this even had a blue cheese burger.”

The waitress comes back with two glasses of water which she slops onto the table. Brent drinks his almost all in one go. The waitress rolls her eyes and goes to fetch a pitcher. Duncs nudges his glass across the table toward him.

“You sure you don’t mind?” Brent asks.

“She’ll be back in a minute,” Duncs says, pushing it closer.

Brent chugs that glass, too, and he can feel Duncs watching him. He passes Duncs’s glass back and says, “Thanks,” as he picks up his own again, holding the cold glass against his bruised eye.

“It’s my fault you’re so beat up,” Duncs says. “I can spare the glass of water.”

“It’s not your fault,” Brent protests. “You didn’t punch me in the face.”

“I invited you to a place with face punching, though.”

“It’s not like I’ve never had a bloody nose before. This barely even ranks on my list of hockey injuries. I mean, I still have that bruise from last week.”

The waitress comes back with their refills and they figure they better order before she decides it’s too much trouble to ever come back. Once she’s stomped off again, Brent leans back against the booth and smiles.

“I still can’t believe you do that regularly, on purpose.  I liked the jumping around parts, but the music still isn’t really my thing.”

“You gave it a shot though,” Duncs says. “That’s more than most people.”

Brent grins wider, feeling especially proud of himself. “Are any of your teammates into that kind of stuff?”

“Not really,” Duncs says. “Sometimes they let me pick the music in the locker room or on a roadtrip, but then I just stick to AC/DC or Metallica or whatever.”

“Huh,” Brent says. “I guess you gotta go easy on them.”

“Well, they aren’t big tough guys like you,” Duncs says.

Brent ignores the dripping sarcasm and lift his water glass and tips it to Duncs. “Why thank you, sir.”

They keep messing around until their food comes, throwing balled up pieces of the paper place mats at each other and arguing about who’s laid the biggest hits on the ice. Duncs was right, their burgers are weirdly good for how run down the place is and how surly the waitstaff are.

“I occasionally know what I’m talking about,” Duncs says when Brent mentions it.

“Only occasionally though, if you really think laying out some dude who hasn’t topped 5′10″ is as impressive as knocking out a behemoth from Lethbridge,” Brent says.

Duncs kicks him under the table, and Brent has to kick him back. That results in a war that has their knees knocking the table around, and half of Brent’s fries fall off his plate, so he grabs a fistful of Duncs’s off his plate.

“Hey!” Duncs yells, grabbing Brent by his wrist. “Just because you can’t keep your food on your plate doesn’t mean you can steal mine!”

“It was your knee that knocked them off, you totally owe me,” Brent replies, refusing to let go of the fries. There’s a brief tussle before they both realize at almost the same time that they’re basically holding hands in the middle of the restaurant. Duncs lets go at the same time Brent drops the fries, which at this point are mostly just a squished glob of potatoes.

He wipes his greasy hand on a napkin. His wrist feels cold where Duncs let go. “Coach would probably say we shouldn’t eat that crap anyway.”

“Yeah, uh, mine too,” Duncs says, picking up his burger. “But what they don’t know won’t hurt ‘em.”

“And we’re growing boys, we need to eat,” Brent says.

“Right,” Duncs agrees, taking a bite of his burger.

They eat mostly in silence after that, and Brent feels awkward and self conscious, like he did the first time he and Duncs spoke. He thought they were past that.

By the time the waitress comes by with the check, Brent is wondering if they’re ever going to talk again. He hadn’t realized how quickly he’d come to enjoy spending time with Duncs. They haven’t even mentioned their project in days, they’ve just been talking and emailing and… being friends. Brent hates the idea of going back to ignoring each other.

Things get a little less awkward when neither of them can do the math to figure out how much the tip should be, and eventually Brent gives up and breaks out his phone calculator.

“Well now that we’ve confirmed every dumb jock stereotype there is, I’m gonna take a piss and then we can go,” Duncs says, getting up from the table.

“Yeah, me too,” Brent says, throwing one more dollar down.

“Holy shit,” he says in awe, catching sight of himself in the mirror when they walk in. The bruise around his eye is ugly as hell. It’s awesome. “I hope it didn’t ruin your appetite, Duncs.”

“Uh, no. Not really. I’m pretty used it, I guess,” Duncs says not looking over at him.

“Yeah, but this black eye is like, legit. I think I even broke a vessel in my cheek, look.” Duncs doesn’t, but when Brent glances away from the bruising on his eyebrow, wow, he sees it’s because he’s concentrating very hard on pissing. Brent steps up to the urinal next to him, and when they’re both washing their hands he can’t help saying, “Seriously though, I look like a badass, right?”

Duncs meets his glance in the mirror briefly. “You look like you got punched in the face. If that’s what a badass looks like, then I guess.”

Brent laughs and bumps his shoulder. “Dude, I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you’d make the worst wing man ever.”

“Yeah, uh, picking up girls isn’t really my strong suit,” Duncs says.

“Why not, dude? There’s gotta be some metal chicks who’d dig your hair. And you can’t tell me you don’t look good in comparison when you’ve got Patty Kane on your team.”

“Yeah… it’s not so much that I’m bad at it as I… don’t want to.”

“Oh, no, yeah, that’s cool. Focusing on hockey and stuff, I get it.” Brent can understand not wanting to deal with the drama of high school girls, especially during hockey season.

“I’m gay, Seabs.”

Brent is a little floored. “Wait. Like. For real?”

“No, it’s something I go around telling people because it makes me more popular,” Duncs says, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket and not meeting Brent’s eye.

“Girls like it,” Brent says, not really thinking. “I mean. Not that that helps you. But this one time-” He cuts himself off, because that’s not the point right now. “Thanks for telling me. I mean. I get that it’s kind of a big deal.”

Duncs shrugs. “We should probably get going.”

“Oh, right, yeah. Standing around in the bathroom is kind of weird anyway.” Brent doesn’t know what to say as he follows Duncs out to his truck.  He doesn’t want Duncs to think he’s some kind of asshole, but Duncs isn’t exactly giving off vibes that say he wants to have a conversation about it right now.

Duncs turns on the engine as soon as he’s in the truck, almost before Brent has even shut his door.

“Hey, I swear it’s cool, man.” Brent says.

“Cool,” Dunc says, gunning the engine on the way out of the parking lot.

“And hey, you still look good when you’re standing next to Pat Kane,” Brent says.

That gets a little grin out of Duncs and Brent relaxes a little.

The ride home is mostly quiet, but it’s not as tense.

“You’re the only one at Delta who knows,” Duncs says suddenly breaking the silence.

Brent nods, “I won’t tell anyone. I mean, It’s not my place.”

Duncs nods. “Thanks.”

Brent is quiet for a second, til he remembers something Erica Kane said. “Were you…out? at Langley?”

“Kind of. Some of the guys on the team know, I mean.”

“Cool. That’s good.”

Duncs nods. It’s not long after that that he pulls up in front of Brent’s house. He puts his truck in park and taps his fingers unevenly on the steering wheel. “Well, I guess I’ll see you on Monday.”

“Yeah, definitely. I had fun tonight, thanks. It was cool seeing what you do for fun.” He winces as he accidentally knocks his hand against his face. “Even with all the bodily harm.”

“Um, that was a little abnormal,” Duncs says.

“The fun or the bodily harm?” Brent teases.

“Uh,” Duncs says.

“Kidding, Duncs. Everyone knows bodily harm is fun. We’re hockey players,” Brent grins and punches him on the shoulder.

Duncs manages a grin in return and punches him lightly back. “You gonna make up a cool excuse for that shiner?”

“Nah, I’ll just tell ‘em you gotta take your lumps if you wanna party with Duncan Keith.” The light in Brent’s living room goes on and the silhouette of his mother appears in the window. “Maybe I’ll tell my mom I was rescuing orphaned kittens, though. I should probably head in before she starts pacing.”

“Yeah,” says Duncs. “See you.”

Brent grins at him and jumps out of the truck. “Night, Duncs.”

“Night.” Duncs waits until Brent opens his front door before putting his truck in gear and heading home.

It isn’t til Brent is going to bed that he realizes he’s still wearing Duncs’s leather cuff.  He takes it off and tosses it on his desk. He’ll give it back Monday.

They finish up their history paper that week, between discussions of their fantasy teams and anything that isn’t their paper, too. Brent keeps meaning to bring Duncs his cuff, but he always thinks of it right before bed, and that’s not so helpful in the morning.

Duncs is weird and quiet the day after they hand it in, so Brent kicks his chair when the teacher’s back is turned and mouths, “what’s up?”

Duncs just rolls his eyes and shakes his head, like he didn’t totally blank Brent in the hallway before lunch, or refuse to take off his headphones off before class started.

“What’s up, man?” Brent asks when they break into small groups to do some work sheet.

“Nothing,” Duncs says, writing his name on the paper.

“You were back to being angry bubble boy,” Brent says.

He actually looks up at that, but just to raise an eyebrow. Brent just stares back and Duncs sighs, “I got a new album I’m really into, that’s all.”

Brent doesn’t quite buy it, but he’s not gonna call him on it.  If Duncs doesn’t want to talk to him, he guesses he can’t make him.  It does make the worksheet an even bigger drag to complete, though. Duncs won’t discuss anything that’s not Canadian history, not even the fact that Delta is playing Langley’s big division rival on Saturday, and he had been almost gleeful about that on Tuesday. Once class is over he follows Duncs out to his locker, even though he can tell he’s being purposefully ignored.

“Look, Duncs,” he says quietly, leaning against the next locker over. “If I said anything stupid or, you know, insensitive to you, I’m sorry. I’m not aiming to be an asshole, but I know I say dumb shit sometimes.”

Duncs keeps on exchanging his books for his next class, but he does glance over at Brent. “You’re not an asshole.”

“I don’t mean to be, but like, sometimes I am, and you just have to call me on it,” Brent says. “I mean it.”

“You’re not an asshole,” Duncs repeats. “You’re being kind of a needy fuck right now, but—”

“Fuck you, needy,” Brent says shoving him. Then he catches sight of the schedule taped to the locker door. “Hey, you guys are doing the invitational next week, too?”

“Huh? Oh yeah,” Duncs says.

“Dude, it’s gonna be awesome! But don’t think I’ll go easy on you if you come floating out of your zone.”

“I don’t float,” Duncs says, disgusted.

“I’m just saying, keep your head up, man. I’m not gonna let up any just because I like you.”

Duncs slams his locker shut. “Yeah, you better not, because I’ll be coming after you.”

“Big words, tough guy.” Brent knocks him on the back.  “We cool now?”

Duncs rolls his eyes. “We’re fine, except for how you’re making me late for class.” Brent raises his hands and stands aside.

Duncs is less weird after that, relatively at least. He’ll nod at Brent in the hall, and lets himself be dragged to lunch with the rest of the Vipers a few times. They pump him for information about the teams from his league they’ll be facing, and he does the same to them.

“It’s gonna be so awesome,” Brent says. “But man, I hope the other people staying at that hotel know what they’re getting into.”

“I hope your team knows what they’re getting into,” Duncs says.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just…beware of Patrick Sharp. That’s all,” Duncs says.

The reason why becomes clear when both teams are hanging out in the lobby of the hotel on the night before the tournament. There’s an organized gathering for all the teams to mingle, but mostly it’s an excuse for the teams to be loud and trash talk each other. Brent is with his team when the elevator door opens and Duncs rushes out, pursued by a guy with a mini water pistol. Duncs is laughing hard and dripping water all down the side of his face, and it’s a far cry from the smirk that’s usually the most Brent can get out of him.

The guy’s pistol runs out of ammo just as Duncs races by the Delta team and Duncs crows triumphantly, wrestling it out of his hands.

“Oh, what now, Sharpy?” He grabs Sharp and puts the empty water gun up against his temple. When he sees Brent he grins and says, “See? I told you about this guy, Seabs.”

“Oh, is this the famous Seabs?” Sharpy asks, elbowing Duncs in the chest to get free. “It’s such an honor to finally meet you!”

Duncs elbows Sharpy back, and Brent laughs. Duncs usually isn’t so…animated.

“Glad to hear that Duncs is spreading tales of my greatness,” Brent says grinning.

Fraz snorts behind him and Brent has to hit him for that.

“Modest, too,” Duncs says dryly. The deadpan is ruined by the grin and casual set to his shoulders. It’s a good look on him.

Duncs is looking a little red, too, but he was that color when he came in, so Brent isn’t sure it means anything. Or what it would mean.

“Have you guys hit up the buffet yet?” Brent asks.

“Nope, but I think Kaner and some of the guys went ahead already,” Duncs says. “You hungry?”

“I can always eat,” Brent replies, and so they set out as a group. Brent ends up in line behind Sharpy and they hit it off well, teasing Duncs and discussing the match ups for the tournament. Sharpy holds up the line at the end trying to chat up the girl in charge of cutting the roasts under the heat lamps. She’s not having any of it, as she’s seen a hundred teenage boys try the same thing already this evening, but Sharpy’s still giving it his best.

Brent jabs at him with his tray. “Come on man, quit embarrassing yourself. Some of us want some beef.”

“I just can’t believe such a beautiful lady would break my heart so callously this way.” Sharpy swoons a little for good measure.

“Maybe she likes them scruffier than you. Not everyone goes for movie star good looks.”

Duncs gives him a confused look before adding, “Or, you know, legal.”

“She could be my Mrs. Robinson!” Sharpy insists. “Oh man, meatballs!”

“Sorry, dude, but I don’t think you’re hot enough to risk a lawsuit for,” Brent says. “Apparently she agrees.”

“Those are fighting words, Seabrook,” Sharp says, pointing a skewered meatball threateningly.

And that’s how he ends up in Duncs and Sharpy’s room, wrestling after dinner.

Sharpy’s yelling about defending his honor and Duncs is laughing at them from his bed, refusing to take sides. Eventually Brent gets a good grip on Sharpy’s legs and tips him over onto the floor, but Sharp grasps on to Brent’s shirt as he’s losing his balance and pulls it most of the way over his head, dragging Brent down with him.

“Hey!” Brent yells, tangled up and trying to get free. “That’s playing dirty!”

“Should have had your fight strap tied down. That’s an extra penalty.”

Brent finally manages to escape from his shirt and sits back on his heels, panting.

“He always this much of a weasel?” he asks Duncs, who’s leaning back against his headboard with his knees up, watching them.

“You get used to him,” Duncs replies. “I’m gonna grab a shower.”

“You’re not even the one working up a sweat, here,” Brent says, pulling his shirt back on. “You’re not gonna fight the winner?”

“Nah, I’ve got to get in before Sharpy takes over the whole bathroom in the morning, trying to make himself pretty.”

“I’ll do my best to ugly him up,” Brent calls after Duncs.

They wrestle a little while longer, but it’s not as much fun without Duncs laughing at them. But Brent doesn’t want to leave while Duncs is in the shower, that’d just be rude.

So he lies on Duncs’s bed to catch his breath while Sharpy sprawls out on his own, and they talk hockey and Sharp tells Brent about his dog and it’s cool.

Duncs looks surprised to see Brent on his bed when he gets out of the shower. He’s got a towel around his waist and he’s dripping wet for the second time tonight. Brent is kind of surprised to realize that he’s actually kind of built. It’s all lean muscle and-

He tears his eyes away when he realizes he’s been staring. “Don’t get mad at me for sweating on your covers, it’s probably one of the least disgusting bodily fluids they’ve been exposed to.”

He’s seen CSI, he knows.

“Um, okay,” Duncs says.

“Anyway, I didn’t want to leave without saying goodbye. So uh, bye, I guess. And I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Yeah. Good luck and stuff.” Duncs turns to fish through his bag and pulls out his sleep clothes. Sharpy appears to be laughing for no reason, but Brent guesses that’s probably not out of character for him.

“You guys too. Except when you’re playing us, right?”

“No, you’ll need all the luck you can get if you think you’re gonna stop us,” Sharpy calls from his bed.

“Yeah, keep dreaming,” Brent replies, checking to make sure he has his room key before he heads to the door.

They play a lot of hockey to get through the round robin to the final rounds, and by the time the Vipers are facing off against Langley, they’ve both guaranteed a spot in the next round, but they’re playing for seeding.

He watched Duncs play against other teams and it was eye opening. Brent shouldn’t be so blown away by how good he is, but he can’t help it. He’s just so fucking fast, and the way he carries the puck over the blue line makes other teams look silly.

Still, he’s determined that Duncs won’t make him look silly, so he’s extra geared up for this game. They’re eyeing each other across the ice, and it’s not exactly friendly, but there’s an excitement there for sure. Brent knows this is gonna be a good game.

He’s not disappointed, either. Kane puts one past their goalie about half way through the first, but Brouwer deflects one of Brent’s shots from the point not even two minutes into the second and it’s basically a battle of attrition from there. Duncs plasters him up against the boards when he’s pinching in one time and Brent is pretty sure his entire side is going to be black and blue.

The game is still tied with five minutes left in the third when Duncs gets called for cross checking in front of his net. He’s obviously pissed about the call as he skates to the box, but this is Delta’s chance to put the game away.

Brent is on point, and Brouwer’s doing everything he can to crash the net while Ladd waits for the outlet pass.

The Langley goalie blocks most of their attempts. Some are just so fucking lucky it’s insane, but just as his shift is coming to an end, Brent chips a shot over the sticks of two defense men and Ladd is able to flick it to the top shelf.

Brent lets out a roar and goes to pile on Ladd before heading to the bench for the next face off.

He can’t help but notice how pissed Duncs looks in his own zone. Brent almost feels bad.

Almost.

The rest of the game is played at an absolutely furious pace, and Duncs seems to be doing his utmost to will the puck into the net. It’s to no avail though, and as the final horn sounds Brent is surrounded by Brouwer and Ladd and the rest of team. They’ll meet Langley again in the semifinals, if they both get there, but for now Brent is happy to go give Carey a head-tap and head back to the locker room to celebrate.

He passes Duncs on his way to the zamboni tunnel though, and he looks even more unapproachable than back when they first met. Even his teammates are steering clear. Brent wants to go over and say something, but he figures that probably wouldn’t be very appreciated just now. He watches as Sharpy skates up and bumps into him gently. He lets himself get caught up in the rush of his teammates and heads in toward the dressing room.

The whole team is stoked, because any win is a good win, and they’re a high seed.  They’ve got a great shot at the finals, too.  It’s hard for Brent not to get caught up in that energy, but he has to admit, he’s not looking forward to playing against Duncs again.

There’s an awkward moment as both teams line up to get on the buses back to the hotel, one team excited and chattering, the other sullen and annoyed. Brent tries to catch Duncs’s eye, but he won’t look away from the bus windows.  Brent huffs, and goes back to laughing with his teammates.

There’s no mingling of teams at dinner that night. The lines are strictly drawn, but that doesn’t stop Brent from balling up his straw wrapper and flicking it at Duncs.

It bounces off Duncs’s arm and lands on his plate. He looks up, ready to be pissed, but when he sees Brent watching him expectantly he restrains himself to just glowering and flipping him off, but low enough so the coaches don’t catch him. Brent smiles hopefully and eventually Duncs rolls his eyes and tosses the wrapper back at him.

After dinner Brent manages to work it so they’re riding the same elevator back to their rooms. They aren’t alone of course, but he stands next to Duncs and jostles their shoulders together as people get in and out.

“Sorry about the game, dude,” Brent says once the elevator is mostly empty.

“No you’re not,” Duncs says, staring at the rising numbers.

“Well, not about winning, but sorry we had to beat you. It was a good game,” Brent tries.

“Hrmph,” Duncs grunts.

“And you were like totally awesome. Thanks for the hit by the way. I’ve got a nice bruise up on my side here,” Brent lifts his shirt. Duncs flicks his eyes over but they flick back to the doors quickly.

“Do you go around showing everyone your bruises, or am I just special?”

Brent flushes. “I’m just saying, it was a good hit, thought you might like to see your handiwork.” The elevator stops at his floor and he looks back at Duncs as he steps out. “You’ll kill ‘em tomorrow, I know it.”

Duncs nods determinedly. “You too,” he says as the doors slide close.

The Vipers are playing first thing the next morning. It kind of blows, because warm ups happen before Brent is even really awake. The other team doesn’t wake up til after the first intermission, and by then they’ve pretty much put the game away already. Brent has two points already, and so does Laddy. They can just coast from there.

After the game, the rest of the team heads back to the hotel to nap, but Langley’s playing next, and the winner will be playing the Vipers the next morning, so he stays to watch. He’s scouting.

Watching Duncs on the ice is mesmerizing. He always seems to be in the right place, breaking up passes or depriving someone of the puck. Brent’s eyes barely leave him whenever he’s on the ice. When Duncs engineers a power play goal, Brent is jumping up cheering as loud as anyone.

He can tell when Duncs notices that he’s there, because he’s skating off the ice after a stoppage and he stutter-steps just a fraction as he glances up at Brent’s section of the stands. Brent grins and waves, and he’s fairly certain that under his helmet Duncs smiles back.

Langley pots two more goals on top of their power play one, and though the other team gets one back with their goalie pulled, at the end of the game they’re advancing to face the Vipers.

He ends up hitching a ride back to the hotel on their shuttle, just because he can. He doesn’t need to change or anything, so he’s first one on, and the Langley guys mostly pretend they don’t see him as they board.

Sharpy gives him a nod, and when Duncs gets on the bus he hesitates for a minute, glancing back at his teammates before dropping into the seat next to Brent.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hey,” Brent says grinning. “You were awesome out there.”

“Thanks,” Duncs says, ducking his head. “I didn’t see your game, but you guys won, yeah?”

“Yeah, rematch tomorrow,” Brent says.

“Have you learned your lesson about pinching in?” Duncs asks.

“What? Hit you before you hit me?” Brent answers elbowing him.

Duncs elbows back and there’s a mini tussle in the seats before Brent holds his hands up. “Truce! And may the best team win tomorrow.”

“So Langley then,” Duncs says.

“So definitely not Langley, then. I heard their number one defenseman is just terrible. What’s his name, Luncan Deith?”

The teasing and bickering continues all the way to the hotel. As they’re getting off the shuttle Sharpy comes up and bumps Duncs in the shoulder.

“Doing all right, Duncs?” he asks.

“Fine, Sharpy, jeez.” He cuffs him over the head. Sharp laughs and aims a weak kick at his legs before heading into the hotel.

“What, does he think I’m trying to sabotage you?” Brent asks.

“He’s just…Just making sure,” Duncs says.

“Does he think he could take me? Because I thought we already established that I’m a superior physical specimen.”

Duncs huffs and shakes his head at that. “Don’t let him hear you say that unless you want to find yourself duct taped naked to a mattress in the lobby.”

“Kinky,” Brent says grinning.

“I guess,” Duncs says. “Do you wanna uh, come watch a movie or whatever?”

Seas sighs, “I would, but I should get back to my guys before I’m accused of defecting.”

“Oh, right, yeah, of course,” Duncs says shoving his hands in his pockets.

“But maybe tomorrow, or when we get back home,” Brent says. “It’s not like we don’t see each other every day.”

Duncs nods. “Yeah, true. I guess I’ll see you on the ice tomorrow, then.”

“Better keep your head up, Keith.”

There’s an awkward moment where they don’t quite know how to how to part ways, since they’re not the kind of friends who bro hug, but Brent still feels weird just walking away. He ends up punching him halfheartedly in the shoulder.

The game the next day is a great reprisal of their first game, but at an even faster pace. The goal posts and cross bars are ringing at both ends of the ice as shots keep missing the net.

Brent isn’t sure how many shots he’s blocked, because honestly, his whole body is starting to feel like one big bruise.

Patrick Kane elbows him in the gut as Brent muscles him off the puck and chips it up the boards to Ladd, who carries it into the Langley zone. Brent follows up to support, and when Duncs lifts Ladder’s stick to steal the puck, Brent is there trying to hold him in the neutral zone a few extra seconds so his teammates have time to get back.

He knows they’re near the boards, and he can tell he’s pissing Duncs off by being everywhere Duncs tries to go, but he’s not expecting Duncs to drop the puck back to his partner and try to just power through Brent like he’s a paper bag.

But he does, and next thing Brent knows, he’s flat on his back and can’t catch his breath.

The ref whistles the play dead, and the whole arena is suddenly quiet. He tries to sit up, but the trainer is already there holding his shoulders to the ice.

A few people are shouting “Seabs!” but one gets a “Hey, back off, you’ve done enough already.”

The trainers and doctors are asking him all sorts of questions about where it hurts and if he can feel various parts of his body, but he still can’t catch his breath enough to answer them. He just shakes his head and tries to get up again. His tailbone is screaming at him, but nothing else hurts any more than it did before he was down on the ice.

The trainers let him stand on the condition that he go back to the locker room to get checked out, and he manages to grin at the cheers and stick taps everyone gives him. He catches sight of Duncs’s face where he’s hovering behind the rest of Brent’s team and he looks sick with worry. Brent tries to give him a wave, but the trainers have both his arms over their shoulders as they help him off the ice.

It only takes a minute of sitting with his head between his knees to catch his breath enough to tell them he’s fine. They’re glad he thinks so, but they still have to check his ribs, which means he’s stuck in the back when the crowd roars above them. He tries to hear the announcer, but can’t tell who scored or even what team.

“So can I go back out?” Brent asks, pulling his pads and jersey back on.

“Yeah, you’re clear,” the trainer says.

Brent tried to tell them that, but they didn’t believe him, and now he’s missed a huge goal. A huge Langley goal, he sees, when he gets back out to the rink.

Fuck.

By the time he’s back on the bench the game is in the waning half of the third and it’s starting to get desperate. Brent is playing with it all on the line, but having to sit out those minutes has messed with his rhythm. He’s just a fraction of a second slower than he feels he should be and it’s hard to push past the frustration. Delta pulls their goalie with about a minute and a half to play, but it’s no good. Langley owns the final score 1-0.

The team gathers around for quick fist bumps while they wait for Langley to finish jumping on each other enough to start the handshake line. Everyone’s glad to see Brent back on the ice and not injured, so they have a little something to be glad about. The team is still pissed at Duncs and keep offering to sucker punch him during the handshakes for Brent, even though he tries to tell them it wasn’t on purpose. He looks across the ice where Duncs is grinning with Sharpy and Kane and the rest of them and feels a weird pang in his chest. Losing sucks.

He wants to be happy for Duncs — it should be easy when he’s smiling like that — but he can’t get get out from under the pain of losing.

The handshake line is rough. Brent likes it so much better when he’s on the smiling side of the line. The Langley guys aren’t being dicks about it, which is good, because they’re all staying at the same hotel. Brent’s guys are definitely giving Duncs the cold shoulder as they pass him in the line, and fuck. Brent doesn’t want that.

He catches Duncs looking down the line for him, and tries to shoot him a smile, but Duncs doesn’t seem to get it. When they reach each other in the line, Duncs starts to say “I’m so sorry, Seabs. I didn’t mean to—”

Brent just grabs him and pulls him in for a hug. “I know Duncs, it’s okay. I’m fine. Good game.”

He feels Duncs freeze, even through all their respective padding, before he returns the hug gingerly. Neither team is very happy about them holding up the line, but whatever, they can deal for a few seconds.

“Good game,” Duncs replies. “Glad you’re okay.”

“Yeah, you’d have to hit me a lot harder than that to keep me down.”

Their teams shove them apart and down the line so everyone can get off the ice, but Brent catches Duncs’s eye as they leave the ice, and his smile doesn’t sting the same way it did earlier.

The Vipers are kind of down, but when they realize they have a night in a hotel, without having to worry about playing a game the next day, the collective mood perks back up.

The party converges in Ladd and Brouwer’s room, with no coaches and plenty of alcohol. Commiserating about their loss turns into recounting everybody’s sweet moves throughout the tournament. Brent’s two assists in the first Vipers game get him heartily toasted, as does his fortitude in coming back after the hit by that fucker Keith.

Brent tries to protest that he’s not a fucker and it wasn’t his fault, but the team is still too sore about losing to hear it. He keeps drinking and hanging out with his guys, but the drunker he gets, the more determined he is that Duncs should know he’s great. Eventually he pulls out his phone and sends him a text.

“ur nott a fuckngi douchbag.” He doesn’t expect a reply because Duncs is almost certainly too busy celebrating his win. Or preparing for the final game they have tomorrow. Fuck. But his phone buzzes ten minutes later and it’s a text from Duncs.

“…thanks? drink water, buddy.”

Duncs is probably right about the water, but there isn’t any. Only beer.

So he adds “if vieprs giv u shit tel me n ill deal w thm”

Because his team can be assholes but he won’t let them be assholes to Duncs for his sake. He doesn’t want Duncs to feel bad. He wants Duncs to feel good.

He explains this to Troy between shotgunning beers, and Troy nods. “I know, Seabsie.”

His phone buzzes again. “I can handle myself, but thanks. Don’t be too hungover to watch me win tomorrow.”

He is hungover, and the arena is just so bright. Half of the Vipers are still in bed, but the rest are up and willing to check out the competition.

Brent is just glad Langley isn’t in white. It makes watching Duncs a whole lot easier.

He cheers all the good Langley plays, even though it makes his head pound. The other team put up a two nothing lead in the first period, but Langley battles back to tie it in the second and third. Duncs is all over the place throwing hits and breaking up passes, and Brent can’t help but admire him. He looks so confident and in control out on the ice. The momentum has turned and it’s looking like Langley are going to pull out the come from behind win when a giant collision in the neutral zone leads to a breakaway for the other team’s best player and he roofs it right into the water bottle with less than four minutes to play.

The last minutes tick down with no change in score and Langley are officially the tournament runners up. Brent watches Duncs mill around sadly on the ice with his team, knocking helmets and tapping shins, and for one sharp moment really wishes they were on the same team, so he could commiserate with him and flick his helmet until he stops looking so sad.

He heads down out of the stands and goes to wait around outside the dressing rooms until Duncs emerges.

Duncs looks surprised to see him there, but Brent doesn’t understand why. Of course he was going to watch Duncs play.

“Hey,” Brent says. “Bummer.”

“Yeah,” Duncs agrees as he brushes some hair out of his face. “Surprised you made it out of bed.”

Brent scoffs, “Please, you think I’m still in Bantam?”

“Judging by your spelling last night?” Duncs asks.

Brent just rolls his eyes. “You were good out there.”

“Thanks,” Duncs says, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“For real, we’d kill if you were on the Vipers.”

It’s Duncs’s turn to snort. “Maybe you should join the Lancers, I mean, we’re obviously the superior team.”

“You think one tournament decides anything?” Brent asks. “And it took a cheap shot to get our best defenseman off the ice so you guys could score.”

Instead of arguing with him about how the hit was totally legal — it was — the humor falls off Duncs’s face. “I didn’t mean to, Seabs, I really didn’t and you-”

“Duncs, relax! It’s hockey, it happens sometimes. And I’m fine now. I mean, besides the soreness and the hangover and everything.”

Duncs doesn’t look entirely convinced, but he doesn’t say anymore about it. “Hey, do you have to go back with your team or do you want to grab something to eat?” Brent asks.

“Yeah, no, um. I think my parents are taking me out to lunch, actually.”

“Oh, okay. I guess I’ll see you back at the hotel then. Or school if not.” Brent holds out a hand and when Duncs takes it he pulls him in for a half hug pat on the back.

Duncs hesitates before returning the pat and then stepping back. “See you later, Seabs.”

Brent doesn’t see him back at the hotel, since everyone’s scrambling to make sure they have all their stuff before checkout, and the lobby is a zoo. Duncs could be down there, but there’s no way to tell.

He falls into his bed the second he gets home, and wakes up for dinner and theoretically to do some homework. But as he stares at his computer screen, and then back down at his history assignment, the effort just isn’t there.

He sends an email to Troy and Ladd to see if they’ve started it yet. And then he sends one to Duncs, just because.

Duncs emails him back with a link to the source he’s using, but also a link to Stamkos scoring a ridiculous spin-o-rama goal against the Habs in a recent game. Brent replies with a video of Ryan Miller making about 14 point blank saves in 5 seconds and they’re off, trading videos back and forth in between homework questions.

After Duncs sends him Shea Weber blasting a shot straight through the net to score, Brent watches it five times in a row.

“now thats just hot,” he replies. “i bet you’d let him put it through your net, huh”

Duncs takes longer than usual to reply, and Brent starts to wonder if he shouldn’t have joked about that. After a couple minute though, Brent’s email alert pops up.

“maybe not, that sounds painful. he is pretty hot though.”

“guess you’re right. Would you pop his water bottle?”

The reply comes faster this time. “you can only do that to a goalie.”

Brent laughs at the computer screen. “Ryan Miller then.”

“only cause they didn’t beat canada.”

“your patriotism will be rewarded one day” Brent replies.

“sure as hell hope so. I’m done with my homework, gonna go pass out. See you tomorrow.”

“see you.” Brent replies. He sighs and spins in his chair before scribbling down some answers on his sheet and calling it done.

He tosses his pen on his desk, and it bounces off Duncs’s wrist cuff from like, forever ago. He really needs to give that back.

Going back to school after the tournament sucks, because they have to catch up on all the stuff they missed as well as the stuff they’re supposed to be learning now. Lunch becomes a homework factory for a day or two, with people sharing answers and textbooks along with stealing each others’ french fries.

Brent is glad that Duncs is right in the mix and that no one is giving him a hard time for being on the team that knocked them out of the tourney. Or at least, no one is giving him a malicious hard time. Apparently the guys think it’s funny to elbow Brent in the deepest bruise over his ribs and then blame Duncs for giving it to him in the first place. Brent’s ribs don’t think it’s funny at all.

“Party at my place Saturday,” Ladd says on Wednesday.

Brent holds back a groan. He’s been having fantasies about sleeping for a solid 48 hours.

But apparently being quiet doesn’t keep the look off his face.

“Oh come on, Seabs, don’t be a wuss. Keith’s coming and he played more than we did.”

Duncs looks surprised to have the conversation suddenly focused on him. Or maybe it’s his assumed attendance. Either way, it takes a second for him to speak up. “I promise not to hit you this time.”

Everyone just thinks that’s hilarious, and Fraz is quick to jump in. “Don’t go making promises you can’t keep. Sometimes he deserves it.”

Brent protests, but is quickly and forcibly overruled. He hopes by Saturday that his bruises will have mostly faded, or it could be an uncomfortable night.

He shows up at Ladd’s with a two four of Moosehead and a bottle of tequila from the shady liquor store that doesn’t card. It feels like ages since he’s hooked up with anyone and tonight he is a man on a mission.

Ladd whoops when he comes in with his haul, and Duncs raises his eyebrows.

“Now you know why I had to come,” Brent says dropping the beer in a cooler. “I’m the only one of these candy asses that looks like a grown ass man.”

That’s not entirely true, as evidenced by the beer and assorted alcohol already filling the Ladd kitchen, but its true enough. He rubs at his stubble — it adds at least three years, but it itches.

Duncs laughs, “Your sacrifice is much appreciated.”

“Thanks, buddy. Now hand me a cold one.”

Many beers and a shot or two later, Brent and Ladd are working on a couple of girls Brent recognizes from his math class last year.

“You should really tell your friend to give Ladder here a chance,” Brent says conspiratorially to the brunette, Kelsey. Or maybe Chelsea? “He’s a great kisser.”

Both girls laugh. “What, do you have his dates fill out surveys?” the blonde asks.

“I never trust second hand information,” Brent says. “I would only make such a recommendation based on my own personal experience.”

“No way,” the blonde says.

“This I gotta see,” Chelsea says.

“Ladies, please,” Ladd cuts in. “We’re not show ponies. We don’t perform on demand. Unless…”

The blonde clearly knows where this is going, but Chelsea looks slightly confused.

“The price of admission,” Brent says, “to see us two demonstrate our affection is a kiss from each of you beautiful ladies.”

Kelsey still looks doubtful. “You two have to kiss first. I don’t want you backing out once you’ve gotten a kiss.”

“And no bullshit peck on the lips, either,” the blonde chimes in. “It has to be a real kiss.”

In response, Brent takes Ladd by the back of the neck and slants his mouth over Ladd’s lips. Ladd steadies himself with an arm at Brent’s waist and kisses back. Both their lips are chapped and taste like beer, but it still feels nice. After five seconds or so they pull back and face the girls triumphantly.

“Did that meet your standards?” Brent asks. The girls both giggle and agree, now willing to pay their fee with interest.

The initial payment goes well enough — her lips are soft and she’s wearing something sweet, and giggles when Brent suggests heading somewhere a little quieter.

He doesn’t stick around to see how Ladd’s doing, just weaves through the crowd holding Chelsea’s hand.

“Shit, sorry man,” Brent says after bumping into Duncs who is just like, standing by a door totally not moving. He didn’t even protect his beer.

“I- Uh. Sorry,” Duncs says. “Sorry about your shirt.”

“No problem, I’ll talk to you later,” Brent says, shoving Duncs in Brouwer’s direction. He’s glad his friends get along with Duncs now. Otherwise he’d feel bad ditching him, but Kelsey’s really hot, in like, a nerdy way.

“Oh wow,” she says. “Your shirt’s like half Molson.”

“Mhmm,” Brent says. “I should probably take it off before it gets all gross.”

He makes a mental note that Duncs is actually a great wingman.

Kelsey — and a closer examination of her necklace as he kisses his way down her throat reveals it really is Kelsey — seems to appreciate him even more without his shirt on. They seem to have ended up in Ladd’s sister’s room. Since she’s gone off to college, Brent doesn’t think she’d mind. They settle on the bed and continue kissing.

“So, did you and Andrew like, date?” she asks breathlessly as he works at getting her bra undone.

“What? Oh, no, no. I don’t like him like that. He’s just a friend. And you’re way hotter than he is anyway.” He finally gets the clasp open and makes a triumphant little sound that sets Kelsey giggling. All thoughts of Ladd disappear pretty quickly after that.

When they emerge from the bedroom some time later the party is still in full swing. Brent doesn’t see Ladd or Duncs, which he assumes is a good thing (get some, boys) until Kelsey’s blonde friend appears out of nowhere with red eyes and blurred makeup and drags her into the bathroom.

At a loss for what to do, he goes into the kitchen for another beer and finds Ladd already holding one and a mixed drink with a dismayed expression on his face.

“I don’t think they’re going to be very friendly on Monday, sorry,” he says as Brent approaches.

“What did you do? You looked like you were doing fine when I left.”

“I don’t even know, man. One minute we were talking about heading out to the porch and the next thing I know she was crying and running away.”

“Must have gotten an actual look at your face with the lights on,” Brent teases, but he pats him on the back sympathetically.

“Fuck, if the most action I get tonight is with you, I’m going to break something,” Ladd groans.

“Oh Andy, you sure know how to make a boy feel special,” Brent coos, wrapping an arm around his shoulder.

“Go be smug somewhere else,” Ladd says, shoving him off. “And don’t call me that.”

“Somebody’s cranky,” Brent says. “Hey, have you seen Duncs?”

“Yeah, I think he took off. He was looking pretty beat.”

“Oh.” Brent wasn’t expecting that. “He look okay to drive?”

Ladd shrugs. “Yeah, I guess. He doesn’t live that far away.”

Brent checks his phone, but Duncs hasn’t texted him or anything to say he was going. Probably didn’t want to disturb him.

“sleep tight lamer” Brent taps out.

Well if Duncs is gone, and Ladd’s going to be a wet blanket, Brent needs to find someone else to be fun with, because it’s a fucking party.

The next morning after Brent wakes up and brushes the dead and decaying taste out of his mouth, he logs on to his computer and sees Duncs in his chat window.

Me: hey you doing okay?
Duncs: yeah fine. why?
Me: you left pretty early last night
just wanted to check you werent dying
Duncs: nope still alive and well
Me: good.
Sent at 11:09
Me: you doing anything today?
Duncs: not really.
homework.
Me: ugh, yeah.
you wanna come over and watch a movie or something?
my dad found the Hunt For Red October in the $5 bin the other day.
Sent at 11:16
Me: you don’t have to or anything
Duncs: no, that sounds good. i’ll head over once i’ve finished my math?
Me: cool man, whenever.
just give me a call so i know when i need to hop in the shower
Duncs: uh, sure

He’s looking forward to hanging out with Duncs like, just the two of them without homework being a thing. Or threats of getting punched in the face.

He runs down to the rec room to make sure it’s not too gross, and runs into his mom on the way back up out of the basement.

“Since when are you this excited about doing laundry?” she asks.

“Huh? Oh, no, just making sure Keith and his friends haven’t destroyed the rec room,” Brent says. “Duncs is coming over, we’re gonna watch a movie.”

“I see,” his mom says. “Well, while you’re straightening up, put this in the wash, would you?”

Brent staggers a little under the load of the laundry basket. “Sure mom,” he says, like he has a choice in the matter.

His phone buzzes around the time he’s got the whites sorted.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hey,” Duncs says. “I’m finished with my homework, I’ll be over in like, twenty minutes?”

“Cool, sounds good,” Brent replies, shoving the load of laundry into the machine. “Are you gonna be hungry? I can throw a pizza in the oven or something.”

“Nah, not unless you’re hungry. Maybe later.”

“Definitely later. See you when you get here.”

“‘Kay, cool.”

Brent gives another glance around the room to make sure nothing’s out of place and then feels dumb. Duncs isn’t going to care if everything’s not spic and span. He’s probably not even going to notice.

Keith’s in the bathroom doing Brent doesn’t even want to know what and Brent has to pound on the door to get him out. “I need to take a shower! Measure your pencil dick in your own room.”

“I’m telling mom you said that,” Keith says as he opens the door with a glare.

“No you’re not,” Brent says shoving his brother out. There’s no way he’s saying “pencil dick” to mom.

“You suck,” Keith says, stomping off to his room.

Brent knows how to take a quick shower, and he does, but his hair is still dripping wet when he hears the doorbell ring.  He grabs the nearest shirt and pulls it over his head before running down the stairs.

He must look kind of weird, because Duncs gives him a strange look when he opens the door. “Sorry, just got out of the shower.”

“Am I early?” Duncs asks.

“No, my brother was in the bathroom so I couldn’t- Anyway. Uh, welcome to my house?” Brent says. “I should probably let you in, huh?”

They head downstairs and Brent shows Duncs the movie cabinet.

“Red October is good,” Duncs shrugs. “It’s the best Jack Ryan movie.”

“Oh for sure,” Brent grins as he loads up the DVD player. They settle next to each other on the couch and watch the movie start.

As Sean Connery redefines the Russian accent and Alec Baldwin runs around trying to get someone to listen to him, Duncs and Brent both sprawl out as they get more comfortable. The couch isn’t that big, but it’s overstuffed and the springs are broken in at all the right places so they end up never wanting to move again.

He’s warm and comfy, the dryer’s going and his whole side is warm from Duncs’s body. They’re not really touching, except for their legs and arms, but everywhere they are is really warm.

It’s getting dark as Alec Baldwin convinces them to do a Crazy Ivan, and when Brent says, “I wish this was Harrison Ford,” his voice seems extra loud.

“He was busy being Indiana Jones,” Duncs says.

“I guess,” Brent says. “But the best Jack Ryan should be in the best Jack Ryan movie.” He lets his head turn toward Duncs as he finishes.
Duncs turns to face him, but doesn’t actually say anything. They just stare at each other as the TV flickers in front of them. Brent feels like there’s something he should be doing, something he’s forgetting.

“I’m hungry,” Duncs says suddenly.

Brent leans into Duncs’s shoulder in order to get his phone out of his pocket to check the time, and when he puts it back away they stay leaning together with their heads almost touching for a minute, until Duncs coughs and straightens up, shifting to lean on his other arm on the back of the couch.

Once the movie’s ended and James Earl Jones has made everything go away, Brent jumps up and claps Duncs on the shoulder.

“Come on, buckaroo. Let’s go make a pizza.”

Duncs stands, but doesn’t follow him up the stairs immediately, so Brent looks back.

“Did you say something?”

“Huh? No, just stunned that anyone under the age of eighty used the word ‘Buckaroo’,” Duncs says.

“Don’t be a hater,” Brent grins. “Now come on, I’m starving.”

They throw the pizza in the oven and then hop up on the kitchen counter while they impatiently wait the twenty minutes for it to be done.

“Oh, hey, I never got a chance to thank you for spilling that beer on me last night,” Brent says. Duncs gives him a weird look.

“What?”

“Yeah, totally smooth way to take my shirt off. Sealed the deal.” He smirks at Duncs, but Duncs doesn’t really return it.

“Uh, sure. No problem.”

“You make a great wing man,” Brent says but Duncs doesn’t seem to recognize the compliment Brent is trying to give him.

They sit in silence watching the timer tick down until Duncs asks, “Do you do that a lot?”

“Do what?” Brent asks. “Get laid? Not as much as I’d like, but you know.”

“No, I mean, kiss guys,” Duncs clarifies.

“Oh, I dunno,” Brent shrugs. “Sometimes, like I said, chicks are into it, and sometimes we can get them to make out, too, which everyone appreciates.”

Duncs looks like he’s about to say something else, but Brent’s mom comes in and sighs. “Brent, get off the counter. We have plenty of perfectly serviceable chairs that we don’t prepare food on.”

They both hop down sheepishly. “And introduce me to your friend.”

“Oh yeah, Mom, this is Duncan Keith. Duncs this is my mom.”

“Nice to meet you, ma’am,” Duncs says, offering his hand. Brent’s mom is clearly charmed.

“Suzanne, please. Now, are you boys eating me out of house and home?”

“It’s one pizza, Mom, come on.”

Suzanne laughs and rolls her eyes. “So long as it’s only the one. Is Duncan staying for dinner?”

Brent looks to Duncs for an answer.

“Um, I hadn’t really-”

“You finished your homework, right?” Brent asks.

“Yeah, I just-” Duncs stops. “Okay, yeah, I just gotta text my mom.”

“Oh good,” Suzanne says. “It’ll be nice to get to know some of Brent’s friends that aren’t Vipers.”

“Yeah, I uh, play for Langley,” Duncs says.

“You’re the one that destroyed Brent!” Keith says from the doorway.

“I’m gonna destroy you,” Brent says. He doesn’t understand why everyone’s so hung up on that one hit.

By the time Brent has chased Keith back to his room and his mom has yelled at them for fighting in the house, the pizza’s ready. They sit at the table, trying to balance their desire to wolf it down with their desire not to burn the roofs of their mouths.

Once the edge of their hunger has worn off, around the second slice, Brent licks the sauce off his lower lip and says, “Sorry about my brother. He’s kind of a pain in the ass.”

Duncs shrugs. “Isn’t that the point of little brothers?”

“Spoken like a younger brother,” Brent says, frowning.

“Middle child,” Duncs corrects. “But little sisters are different, I think.”

“Less annoying.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Duncs says. “But not as much with the following you around trying to be just like you.”

“So your sister wears colors other than black?” Brent teases.

Duncs flicks a pepperoni at him. “My sister won’t wear anything that doesn’t have a picture of a horse on it.”

“Is that why your hair’s so long, so she can pretend you’re her pony?”

Duncs reflexively shoves his hair out of his face. “My hair is not a mane.”

Brent laughs at Duncs’s indignation and swipes the last slice of pizza.

Dinner goes well enough. Brent only gets yelled at for threatening his brother twice, and Duncs talks a little. Once he finally heads home, his mom says, “Duncan seems like a nice boy.”

It’s a dumb way to put it, but Brent mostly agrees.

“He’s welcome back any time,” his dad adds while he loads up the dishwasher.

“Um, cool,” Brent says. “I’m gonna go do some reading for class.”

He doesn’t see Duncs until lunch the next day, when Brent drops between him and Ladd.

Ladd’s still bitching about striking out at the party, and Brent’s appearance doesn’t really help. “-and then she starts crying for no reason while this one’s already half undressed!”

“What did you say to scare her off?” Fraz asks, stealing some of Brent’s grapes.

“Nothing, I swear! I just put my arm around her shoulder and asked if she wanted to go outside and she exploded.”

Duncs snorts from Brent’s other side, and everyone turns to look at him. “Well, you look exactly like her ex.”

No one has any idea what he’s talking about, so he has to continue. “He was a senior last year. I think he’s in Ottawa somewhere now. Her locker was next to mine last year, and they were always there making out between classes.”

Brent looks around, but none of this appears to ring any bells.

“Wow, you guys don’t notice anything that goes on here that isn’t related to the Vipers, do you?” Duncs asks.

Everyone shrugs. “We noticed you,” Brent tries.

Duncs raises an eyebrow. “Because we got assigned to a project together.”

“That’s not true, I noticed you before. You were the-” but he can’t exactly say “weirdo who thought he was too good for the Vipers” which is what he actually thought, so he falls silent.

“You were the badass everyone was too scared to talk to,” Fraz interjects.  Duncs flushes uncomfortably.

“Luckily we’re friends now and know you’re not a badass after all,” Brent grins.

“He badass’d you onto the ice pretty hard in the tourney,” Ladd says, stealing one of his fries.

“It wasn’t that badass!” Brent protests. He doesn’t understand why everyone keeps bringing it up.

“It was kind of badass,” Duncs says and Brent turns to gape at him.

“They thought he broke your ribs,” Brouwer points out.

“I just had the wind knocked out me!” Brent says. “I could’ve told them they weren’t broken, but they dragged me off the ice.”

“Because Duncs knocked you on your ass,” Fraz says. “Face it, you got owned.”

Brent doesn’t know why he’s friends with such assholes.

He’s working his way up to a perfectly good sulk when Duncs slides his slice of pie over.

Brent thinks it probably sets a bad example if he lets his feelings get bought by food, but it’s not like he’s going to turn down free pie.

“Hey,” Ladd says, “the rink by my house has open skate tonight. Anyone in for a little skating around, maybe some three-on-three?”

“I’m up for it,” Brent says and Duncs nods his agreement too.

Unfortunately it turns out the physics class that Fraz and Brouwer are in have a huge lab report due the next day, so everyone else is out.

“Well that’s not much fun,” Ladd grumps. “I get enough of two-on-one drills in practice.”

“I could give some of my guys a call, if you don’t mind skating with the enemy,” Duncs offers softly.

“Yeah, call Sharpy,” says Brent. “I liked that guy.”

“Everybody likes Sharpy,” Duncs says. It sounded like Duncs was rolling his eyes, but Brent looks over too late to tell. He’s already got his phone out to text him.

“Jealous, Duncs?” Brent asks as he elbows him. “You know I like you better.”

That definitely gets an eye roll, but he doesn’t actually respond to Brent, he just looks to Ladd when his phone vibrates. “Yeah, Sharpy’s in.”

“Cool,” Ladd says. “Rematch from the invitational.”

Brent is looking forward to getting some pride back from that lost, but as they lace up their skates that afternoon Sharpy suggests. “O versus D?”

“Too intimidated to play against me?” Ladd cracks.

“Nah, just thought you might need the help.”

They skate around the rink a few times, warming up, and then it’s game on. Before long they’ve all worked up a sweat, chasing each other over the ice and banging off each other and the glass.

After the first five minutes or so, Duncs seems to instinctively know where Brent will be on the ice, even on the wide open rink that 2-on-2 leaves. Their passes are even crisper than with Brent’s usual D partner and pretty soon they’re blowing Sharp and Laddy out of the water.

“How’s that helping you’re doing working out?” Duncs teases Sharpy as Brent dekes past him and pots another one.

“Just because we’re not like, mind melded like you guys or whatever,” Ladd protests.

“Green is an ugly color on you, Laddy,” Brent says, skating around the back of the net. “Just because I’ve found my defensive soulmate in Duncs here is no reason to get so jealous.”

“Oh Christ,” Ladd says, rolling his eyes. And that’s just begging for a noogie, though Ladd tries to fight him off with a face wash.

“You two would be insufferable on the same team,” Sharp says.

“We’d be amazing!” Brent protests, and when he looks to Duncs for agreement he’s just grinning and shaking his head.

“Sharpy’s just afraid I like you better,” Duncs says. That gets a cough from Sharp, and Duncs flushes a little.

“He may be prettier, but guys who know they’re pretty are usually assholes,” Brent says.

He isn’t too surprised when Sharpy takes a run at him then.

From there it devolves into a friendly scrum, everybody trying to facewash everybody else. They end up in the corner of the rink, Duncs crushed up against Brent’s back as Ladd tries to jab him up under the ribs, while Sharpy combines reaching over Brent’s shoulder to push at Duncs with fending off Brent’s attempted stick taps to the balls.

Eventually they manage to tip themselves off balance and collapse to the ice in a tangle of sticks and bodies. Duncs grunts as Brent’s elbow lands in his gut while Brent finds himself with a mouthful of Sharpy’s glove.

Brent shakes his head, dislodging Sharp’s glove from his mouth and ends up chewing on Duncs’s hair instead. It tastes better at least.

“You planning on getting up anytime, Sharpy?” Duncs asks, once he catches his breath.

“Eh, I’m not sure,” he says from somewhere behind Brent’s shoulder. “I like the symbolism of you all crushed beneath me.”

Brent snorts and he realizes he can see the goosebumps forming where his breath hits Duncs’s skin. It’s fascinating and a little distracting, so it takes him a few extra seconds to realize the pressure on his back is gone and Ladd and Sharpy are back on their skates, leaving him free to stand.

He clambers up on his feet and turns to offer Duncs a hand. Duncs accepts but immediately bends down again to fix a skate lace that had apparently come loose. Sharpy skates a lazy loop from behind Brent up around Duncs until he drifts up to where Ladd was trying to balance the butt of his stick on the toe of his skate.

“What do you say we switch up the teams a little, try and even out the score?” he asks.

“Your ass is just chapped because you’re no good on a team without me,” Duncs grins, standing up finally.

“Ha, fuck you, Keith. Fine, Seabs, you’re with me.” Sharpy takes Brent by the elbow and skates them to center ice, picking up the forgotten puck on the way. “First one to five goals wins.”

They slip back into the game easily, but it’s a definite shift going from Duncs to Sharp by his side. It’s not as easy as it was with Duncs, and there are a few more missed passes – especially the times when Brent pays more attention to finishing a check on Duncs than collecting the puck on his tape.

Ladd scores first when Brent can’t lift his stick in time to take away the shot, but Sharp wins the next face off and dishes it back to Brent.

He gets past Ladd easily enough, and when Duncs comes barreling down on him, he flicks it over to Sharpy, who pots it easily.

They go back and forth for a few more rounds, til Duncs and Ladd have a 4-3 lead. Ladd fishes the puck out of the net, and bounces it on his stick a few times.

“Ready to get beat, Seabsie boy?”

“I think you mean ready to beat your ass, Laddy,” he retorts.

“Yeah?” Ladd laughs. “You beat a lot of asses, do you?”

“Come on, quit yapping and let’s do this,” Duncs says as he puts his blade to the ice.

The hitting and jostling picks up now that Duncs and Ladd are playing for the win and there’s a long stretch where they’re all locked up against the boards, kicking and jabbing trying to get the puck free. Eventually Brent pokes it ahead just enough that Sharp can grab it for a free breakaway all the way down the ice and it’s a tie game.

There’s no talking before the next face off, they just immediately get back to it. Ladd wins the puck, but Brent is able to muscle him off of it easily. He takes a shot at the net- without a goalie it’s got a good chance of going in, but Duncs goes streaking down the ice and manages to get his stick on it to deflect it wide.

Ladd picks it up behind the net and Duncs carries it back up the ice. Sharpy tries to poke check it as he crosses center ice, but Duncs keeps control. Brent is skating back as fast as possible, but when Duncs takes a shot from the blue line, he can’t reach the puck. It’s not even a real scrimmage, but he ends up sliding on his stomach across the ice, and the puck deflects off his out reached glove.

Duncs makes a noise between a grunt and a growl that has Brent grinning as he gets back to his feet.
Sharpy’s got the puck now, and is making a break for it. Ladd’s doing his best to corral him, but Brent catches up to him and they’ve got a give and go as Ladd tries to defend them while Duncs skates after them.

Brent has a clean shot once they finally reach the circles and snaps it off over Ladd’s out stretched stick and it hits the back of the net.

He throws his hands in the air grinning as Sharpy wraps him up in a hug. Ladd boos them cheerfully while fishing the puck out of the net. Duncs coasts up and knocks them both in the calf with his stick as he passes.

“How does that beating feel, hey, Laddy?” Brent calls.

“Like you eked out a win that could have gone either way, actually.”

“I guess we’ll have to do this again with guys who can actually take on Duncs and me,” Brent grins, throwing an arm over Duncs’s shoulder.

“You two do make quite the pair,” Sharpy says, grabbing a water bottle.

Duncs makes an aborted noise in his throat, and Sharpy gives him a look that Brent doesn’t quite understand. He does toss Duncs one of the other bottles which Brent makes grabby hands for. Duncs rolls his eyes but passes it over.

“Anyone else hungry?” Ladd asks.

Brent nods his head even as he sucks down the water. “But shower first.”

The rink has a line of shitty showers that give you 20 seconds of lukewarm water at a time, so the showers are a fairly rush job. In the time honored tradition of communal showers, Brent focuses mostly on the faucet, but he can’t help but notice that Sharpy and Duncs seem to be having a competition for who can portray the greatest number of emotions in a conversation that involves only their eyebrows.

Changing in the locker room involves the usual number of towel snaps and sweaty socks flung in each others’ faces. Duncs looks a lot different when his hair’s wet, and his chest looks really pale in comparison to the black jeans he’s currently pulling on.

“Trying to get some tips on how to put your pants on, there?” Sharpy asks him, and Brent realizes with a start that he’s kind of staring. “Don’t worry, it can be a difficult skill to master.”

He busies himself gathering up his skates and gloves. “Nah, I’m good. Your mom gave me a reverse demonstration last night.”

Sharpy just snorts, “Yeah right, dude.” He opens his mouth to say something else but Duncs throws a glove at his head, which just makes him smirk.

It’s unfair for people to look that good when being that jerky.

“So where are we going to go?” Duncs asks, changing the subject once his shirt is on.

For Ladd and Brent, post practice food is always at the same diner. “Unless you wanted to go somewhere else?” Brent asks.

They pile into the diner and even though it’s not a team practice, their usual waitress is there to give them their corner booth and automatically fill up their first round of coffee.

They order enough eggs and meat products to feed several families, and settle in to blow straw wrappers at each other until the food arrives.

“So, anything going on over at your school this weekend?” Ladd asks Sharp, flicking a balled up piece of napkin at his hair.

Sharpy shrugs. “We’ve got a game Saturday morning and then I have a bitch of a math test on Monday. Looks like it’s not going to be my partyingest weekend.”

“Sucks for you,” Duncs says unsympathetically.

“What about you, Duncs?” Brent asks. “You up for hanging out, or are you gonna ditch us for your old friends?”

“I see you guys every day,” Duncs points out. “Is it really ditching?”

Ladd shrugs, which, whatever what does he know.

“Uh, yes?” Brent says, staring at him. “Besides, what are you going to do with those guys? Play video games in Patrick Kane’s basement?”

“Sometimes,” Duncs says.

Brent just snorts, “You’d rather do that than party with us?”

“Maybe,” Duncs says, spearing a sausage. “Don’t pretend you never play any video games. I’ve seen your Xbox.”

“Yeah, but-”

“Pouting is beneath you, Seabs,” Sharpy interrupts.

“Whatever, I was pouting beneath your mom last night.”

Sharpy just looks a little queasy. “You’re really not very good at that, are you.”

Ladd and Duncs both shake their heads in agreement.  Luckily the waitress comes by to refill their mugs before Brent can work up into full outrage over this betrayal by his friends.

“So?” Brent asks as they pay the bill in a stack of crumpled bills.

“So what?” Duncs asks.

“Are you going to be awesome or lame this weekend?”

“I dunno,” Duncs shrugs. “We’ll see.”

“There you go Duncs,” Sharp says clapping him on the shoulder. “Play hard to get.”

“Stop making trouble just because you can’t have any fun this weekend,” Duncs says.

He still won’t commit at lunch on Friday. “It depends on how our game goes and what the boys have planned.”

Brent sighs. “Well we’re gonna be at Richards’ place. I’ll text you the address in case you deem us worthy.”

Saturday night comes soon enough and finds Brent drinking Mike Richards’ cheap beer and trying to find a girl in the place who Jeff Carter won’t swoop in and steal as soon as they get a conversation going. Brent doesn’t know why girls are so eager to get with him, he’s annoying as fuck and he bleaches his hair.

Mike’s parents have a pretty sweet entertainment system and a very heated Madden tournament appears to be taking place in front of it. He pulls out his phone and texts Duncs.

“videogames w beer > videogames w kane. come over, lamer”

Just as he hits send, Troy slams into him from the side, gripping him round the shoulders and yelling drunkenly about how great all his friends are.

Duncs doesn’t reply, and Brent is more than a little disappointed, so he pounds another beer.

He’s just opened another one when it’s plucked out of his hand. “Hey, asshole,” Brent says, turning to face the thief.

“You promised me beer,” Duncs says.

Brent smiles wide and throws his arm around Duncs’s neck. “You made it! I knew you liked me better.”

“It was on my way home,” Duncs shrugs, but he’s smiling a little.

“Come on, let’s go show everybody what a Duncan Keith party looks like.” He’s maybe a little drunker than he meant to get this fast.

Duncs snorts, but he lets Brent keep his arm around his shoulder as he leads him through the crowds. Fraz and Ladd greet them as they pass by, but they seem to be heavily involved in a beer can stacking endeavor and not inclined to talk.

As they reach the main living room with the staircase up to the rest of the house, Brent sees Jeff Carter disappear into what looks like a bedroom with the captain of the girl’s volleyball team, so it looks like he might finally get the chance to score with some girls.

He’s kind of surprised when Duncs damn near chugs his beer and then immediately reaches for another one. He hesitates before opening it though, “Is there anything stronger?”

“I didn’t bring anything,” Brent says. “But we can see if anyone wants to share.”

Brent knows the generous drunks from the greedy ones at this point, and he and his tequila bought some goodwill last week. “Jack Daniels okay?”

“Fine,” Duncs says.

Brent was planning on mixing it with some Coke or whatever, but Duncs just knocks it straight back. “Wow, are you on a mission or what?”

“Something like that,” Duncs says after chasing with his beer. “Listen, do you wanna go somewh-”

“Brent!” a familiar voice says from behind him.

“Hey, Kelsey,” he says turning around. She’s got a different friend with her tonight.

“You know Cara, right?”

“I do now,” Brent says. Cara’s got a nose ring and that whole hot punky chick thing going on. “This is Duncs.”

“We’ve got a proposition for you,” Cara says with a smile.

Just the way she says that has blood rushing to Brent’s dick. “Oh really?”

“We’ll make out,” Kelsey says, and Brent nearly has to pinch himself. “If you make out.”

“We saw Andrew was kind of busy, but we’re not really picky,” Cara says.

Brent turns to Duncs, his eyes wide and pleading, “Duncs? I mean I know it’s not your thing, but it shouldn’t be too painful, right?”

And since Duncs won’t be going off with Cara, maybe Brent could convince both of them…

But Duncs’s face shutters almost immediately. He swallows and clenches his fists. “I’m not kissing you for a fucking game. Find someone else.” He turns and sets his beer on the nearest flat surface hard enough for foam to come sloshing out the top before heading straight to the door.

“Wow,” says Kelsey, eyebrows raised as she watches his retreating back. “I didn’t take him for a homophobe.”

“He’s not!” Brent protests, taken aback. “He’s- He’s just shy.” He starts to go after Duncs to see if he can catch him before he leaves for good, but Kelsey takes his arm.

“Hey,” she says, smiling up at him, “just ‘cause your friend was a jerk doesn’t mean we have to give this up as a lost cause?”

Brent stares at them, and they’re both really cute girls — really cute — but all of a sudden all he can think of is how he was gonna kiss Duncs.  He wishes he weren’t quite so drunk, because he’s still not sure why Duncs ran out like that. It’s not like Brent would have minded if he had just said no. But as soon as he has that thought he realizes it’s not true. He hadn’t contemplated kissing Duncs before, but now the thought that Duncs doesn’t want to kiss him is making him way sadder than it should.

“Uh, I think I should go actually,” Brent apologizes to the girls. “I’m pretty drunk.”

He wants to go home, but he’s way too drunk to drive, and they were just going to crash at Troy’s, since he lives like a block away. But Brent just wants to go and be alone, or find Duncs and figure out why he’s so mad at him.

He sends him a quick text “im sorry. call me.” Brent doesn’t really expect a reply, but when it doesn’t come and doesn’t come, his mood just sinks lower.

“I’m gonna go,” Brent tells Brouw and Ladd. The beer stacking is reaching impressive heights.

“Dude, it’s early!” Troy says.

“I know but Duncs is mad at me,” Brent says. “He just left and I don’t know why and. I’m just gonna go.”

“You’re not driving,” Ladd says.

“No,” Brent says. He’s drunk, not stupid. “I think I’m just going to walk home.”

“That’s like two miles,” Troy points out. “Let’s just go back to my place.”

“No, it’ll be fine,” Brent says. “Stay, finish your tower.”

It’s not that cold out, so the walk is fine at first. He calls Duncs once he’s far enough from the house that the noise isn’t a disruption. It goes straight to voicemail. “Hey, Duncs it’s me. I’m sorry man, I didn’t mean to- I’m sorry. It didn’t mean anything, don’t be mad. I was just thinking with my dick and acted like a giant douche. I’m sorry.”

He’s halfway home when it starts drizzling. It’s the worst night ever.

He wakes up the next morning face down on his bed, his damp jeans still hanging off one ankle. He groans at the awful taste in his mouth and flops over onto his back. His eye catches on his phone on the bedside table, but when he checks it there are no messages and no missed calls.

His head’s not actually hurting too bad, but he still feels vaguely queasy and upset. Thinking over last night doesn’t make any of it make more sense, it just leaves him confused and slightly miserable.

He plods downstairs to see if his mom is cooking breakfast, but it looks like his parents have already left for church, so he just grabs a box of cereal and collapses on the couch in front of the TV.

He eats it by the fistful and watches a replay of the Oilers vs Flames from the night before. It’s a stupid game, and yelling at the TV makes a good distraction from the awful knot in his stomach.

During the second intermission he realizes his parents are going to be back soon, and he just doesn’t feel like talking to anyone, so he brushes the crumbs off the couch and shoves the box back in the pantry before heading back to his room.

There’s a new post on his Facebook wall from Patrick Sharp that just says “you dumb fuck.” And fuck that guy. Seriously. What does he know?

He tries calling Duncs again, but there’s still no answer. Brent doesn’t want to be that weird clingy guy, so he decides to just wait for school the next day. They have class together. Duncs can’t not answer him then.

But when Brent walks into the classroom the next morning, Duncs’s headphones are on loud enough that it must be physically painful to him, and he’s focused on his notebook like it’s the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen. It’s worse than before they started hanging out because he’s clearly actively ignoring Brent. He glances over at Fraser and Laddy, but they both shrug sympathetically.

Class drags on endlessly and Brent can’t quit glancing over at Duncs every few minutes. He’s looking at the teacher every time, but his paper is blank and noteless.

Brent is up and out of his chair before the bell finishes ringing at the end of class and manages to catch Duncs before he can make his exit.

“Hey, I know I’m a dick, but can we at least talk? I’m sorry Saturday was so-”

“Not here,” Duncs says, brushing past him and jamming his headphones in his ears.

He doesn’t show up at lunch, and when Brent looks for his truck in the parking lot after school, it’s already gone.

“come on dude” Brent texts him. There’s no reply before he has to go to practice and his phone is still unused when they finish up. He throws his gear back into his bag and storms out of the locker room before anyone else, probably the first time that’s ever happened.

He’s tired and frustrated at Duncs, so maybe it was a little bit intentional when Brent started driving to his house, but he’s still surprised when he finds himself parked outside.

He stares at the house and the garage and considers trying the phone again, but he ends up just hopping out and racing up the path to the front door.

Brent knocks on the door and hopes Duncs will open it. He’s never been inside before or really met any of Duncs’s family. But the way his day is going it just makes sense that it’s his dad who opens it.

“Um, hi,” Brent says, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Is Duncs home?”

“He’s still at practice,” Mr. Keith says. “He shouldn’t be home for another hour at the earliest.”

“Oh,” Brent says. He really should have considered this. “Well, can you tell him Seabs stopped by? And that he should call me or email me or something?”

Mr. Keith looks a little bemused, but he agrees to pass on the message to his son.

So now there’s really not much else he can do if Duncs is truly determined not to talk to him, at least not without looking like a crazy stalker. He drives back home and makes a beeline straight for his bed, where he lays and stares at the ceiling until his mom calls him for dinner.

He’s quiet at dinner, but he almost chokes on a carrot when his dad asks him if it’s girl troubles bothering him.

“No, Dad, jeez. It’s just… My friend Duncs is mad at me because I said something stupid and I feel like crap about it.”

“Language, Brent,” his mom admonishes. “I hope you apologized to him.”

“I tried, but he won’t really talk to me.”

“Well, sometimes you just have to let people be upset for a while. I’m sure he’ll come around eventually.”

“I guess,” Brent sighs, making fork tracks in his mashed potatoes. “It still sucks though.”

He checks his email after dinner, since his phone was silent in his pocket the whole time. It’s like, 8:30. Duncs should totally be home by now, but the only new email is a 15% off coupon from the NHL store. Brent deflates. He was expecting something from Duncs, even just an email calling him a stalker. Brent wouldn’t have to stalk him if he’d just answer a text or a phone call.

So he surfs around on Facebook – Duncs hasn’t blocked him or anything, and his status is song lyrics Brent doesn’t recognize, and the only new posts on his wall are from Sharpy saying they have to hang out that weekend. It’s stupid. Sharpy just saw him like an hour ago, so Brent doesn’t see why he has to write on Duncs’s wall.

Duncs’s reply to the wall post pops up in his news feed after Brent finishes his math homework. So he’s definitely home, and definitely online. But he’s invisible on IM. Brent can take a hint. He’ll try again tomorrow at school.

Tomorrow comes, and Duncs is stonewalling just as hard as the day before.  Class seems never-ending, and Brent can’t concentrate on any of the work he’s supposed to be doing.

At lunch Duncs is again nowhere to be seen, even though it’s taco day: the one day of the week when the cafeteria food is actually decent. Brent munches glumly on a churro and listens to the guys talking about math tests, and who said what in the halls between class, and what coach is going to make them do next practice. Eventually Troy notices he’s not participating much in the conversation and elbows him in the side.

“You with us here, Seabs?”

“What? Yeah, I’m fine.” He grins, showing off all the cinnamon and sugar and pastry stuck in his teeth.

“Eugh, gross, man. No one wants to see that.”

“Your mom wants to see it,” Brent says. Even he knows it’s stupid, but it’s expected.

He ducks the tortilla chip tossed in his general direction, but it doesn’t stop the salsa from dripping onto his shirt. “Fuck you guys,” Brent says, swiping at it with a napkin.

Ladd is cracking up way more than a little salsa on his shirt is worth, so he has to turn to Troy. “Where else is it?”

“Your hair.”

“Why’d you tell him?” Fraz asks. “He would’ve gone to class like that!”

“You better watch yourself, Fraser,” Brent says rising to his feet. “I’m going to go clean this up.”

He makes sure to clip Fraz on the back of the head his way to the bathroom.

He’s flicking jalapeños off his fingers and into the sink when one of the stalls opens behind him and Duncs steps out, but he freezes when he sees Brent.

“Hey!” Brent says, smiling hopefully. It fades quickly when Duncs doesn’t react. He doesn’t even move. “I can see you, you know.”

That gets a reaction out of Duncs, even if it is only to drop eye contact and move to the sinks to wash his hands.

Brent figures he may not get a better opportunity to really apologize any time soon, so he takes a breath and turns toward Duncs.

“Duncs, I really am sorry about Saturday. I didn’t mean to like, make you uncomfortable.”

Duncs turns his head to stare at him, but he doesn’t say anything. Brent shifts uncomfortably and wishes he didn’t smell like hot peppers while having this conversation.

“It didn’t mean anything,” he tries. “I was just messing around ‘cause those girls were hot.”

Duncs frowns and crosses his arms over his chest. “I don’t like being used.”

“No, I get that. It was a dick move on my part. It won’t happen again, promise.”

That declaration doesn’t seem to make Duncs any happier, but he does uncross his arms and sigh. “Yeah.”

“So are we good?” Brent asks finally starting to relax for the first time since Saturday night.

But the bell rings then and Duncs grabs a paper towel. “I have to go.”

“Oh, um, okay,” Brent says. “I’ll see you in history.”

Duncs is already out into the hall, and Brent still has tomato chunks in his hair that need to get gone before English.

History is weird. Things are a little better, but they’re not fixed. Like, Duncs keeps his headphones on till class starts, but he’s not acting like there’s a wall between their desks.

Mrs. Holtzapple gives them a worksheet to work on in groups, and Troy kicks Duncs’s desk until he turns it around to join them. Brent is just so glad that Duncs is talking to them a little, even if it is mostly about the assignment, that he doesn’t realize til after class that Duncs never actually said anything to him.

He has to get right to hockey practice after school, so he can’t catch Duncs in the parking lot before he leaves. Practice is brutal since their coach pushes them hard during night skates, and soon enough Brent doesn’t have the free mental energy to spend wondering how things stand with him and Duncs.

He comes back round to it when he finally gets home and collapses in his bedroom, having wolfed down his mom’s pot roast like it was his first meal in days. There’s still no email or anything from Duncs, and none of his other friends are online, not that he’d know how to talk about this to them anyway.

His gaze lands on the cuff Duncs lent him back when they went to that concert, still lying on his desk where he’d tossed it. He picks it up and turns it over in his hands, bending it a little to feel the give. On a whim he buckles it around his wrist and stares at it, remembering that first night they’d really hung out.

It seems like a million years ago — he barely knew Duncs at all then — but it was an awesome time. Even with all the bleeding. Come to think of it, he gets injured a lot being friends with Duncs, but it’s totally worth it.

He wonders if offering to let Duncs punch him would help Duncs forgive him so they can just get back to normal or whatever.

Brent can totally work a black eye too, so it might even work in his favor on the getting laid thing. He starts rubbing himself through his jeans, just idly at at first, but when his dick starts perking up and pointing out that no, he’s not too tired to jerk off, he quickly kicks them off.

He rearranges his head more comfortably on his pillow and stretches his legs out, cupping himself through his boxers. He’s not thinking of anything in particular yet, just floating through various vaguely sexy images and stroking absently. Once he’s hard enough to pull at the elastic of his boxers he pushes them down his thigh, and that’s when Duncs’s cuff catches on his hipbone and sends a shiver through his whole body.

It makes his wrist look different when he glances down at it, like it belongs to someone else. Of course, the only person Brent has ever seen wear one of these is Duncs, and oh wow, he can practically see his dick jump at that thought. He wraps his hand around his cock, the whole matter of getting off suddenly seeming more urgent than it did two minutes ago.

He watches his hand as he smears the pre-come around the head of his dick and imagines that it belongs to Duncs. Maybe pressed up in the corner of the showers last week, or in the hotel back during the invitational. Or fuck, no, in the bathroom of that shitty club when they were both bruised and bloody and Brent would have to be careful when he kissed Duncs because otherwise it would hurt. But probably he wouldn’t care, because Duncs would have his hand around Brent’s cock and it would look just like this. Almost. Fuck, he doesn’t care about the realism of the view, he just strokes himself faster.

He tightens his grip on his cock as the scene in his mind shifts to pushing Duncs up against the wall, crowding him. He would bend down to suck at Duncs’s throat and wind a hand into his hair to tilt his neck for better access. He turns his face into his bicep to muffle a groan as he drags his knuckles just under the head of his dick. Of course Duncs would know just how to touch him to turn him on the most.

Duncs would be panting a little and Brent could feel his pulse speeding up under his lips and his skin would taste a little salty from the hot and crowded mosh pit. Any one of those dudes could walk in on them right then and — “oh shit,” Brent swears as his orgasm catches him by surprise.

He strokes himself through it and then fumbles for the box of tissues next to his bed so he can clean himself up. He grimaces when he realizes there’s a little bit of come on Duncs’s wrist cuff. Duncs is going to be so pissed if Brent doesn’t get it all off.

Suddenly Brent feels like he’s been hit by a ton of bricks, because he wouldn’t think there was a problem with the stain, had Duncs been wearing it when it happened. Like, for real, and not just in his head. He can barely breathe his chest is so tight all of a sudden.

In between the panic he wonders why it didn’t bother him while he was getting off, but he’s not really in the habit of analyzing his jerkoff fantasies as they happen. He feels a flush of hot and then cold run through him as he tries to figure out how long he’s been oblivious to the fact that he apparently wants to do Duncs. He has a dawning suspicion that it’s a lot longer than he’s comfortable with.

And it wasn’t like the situation between him and Duncs wasn’t shitty enough already. It was bad enough when Brent only wanted Duncs to be his friend, and if Duncs doesn’t want to hang out with him already, he certainly won’t appreciate Brent wanting to date him.

He pulls his boxers back on and turns off the light. It’s still kind of early, but he doesn’t really feel like being awake right now.

His mind races as he stares at the shadows on the ceiling before the fatigue of the day finally pull him down into sleep.

Brent panics when he sees Brouwer dragging Duncs to their table at lunch the next day. He’s just not ready to sit by Duncs and talk to him or look at his hands or his neck…

So he shoves the rest of his sandwich in his mouth and grabs his bag of chips. “Forgot to do my French homework, see you guys in class,” he says as he grabs his stuff. He has to take off before someone offers to let him copy.

It isn’t until he’s hidden in the library that he realizes how stupid that was. If Duncs would go back to just being Brent’s friend, he could work up to asking Duncs out, and even if he got shot down Duncs would at least be nice about it.

Right now he’d probably be laughed at, or punched.

It’s not like he can go back now though, so he just makes a promise to himself not to freak out in history class. Or at least not to be obvious that he’s freaking out.

Brent gives Duncs a smile and a nod as he sits down at the beginning of class, which Duncs returns with a small nod of his own, though he gives a bit of a weird look too. Brent will take anything rather than being ignored at this point. He’s pretty sure he’s going to do terribly on this next test, considering how little he’s been paying attention in class lately, but he can’t help but be distracted by the way Duncs is sitting and the muscles in his forearm as he flips his pencil around his thumb.

He shakes his head hard once and forces himself to apply himself to his notes.

Maybe he could ask Duncs to study with him and then when they’re alone — he pinches his eyes shut, like that’ll make the mental image go away.

He really is going to need some tutoring, at this rate.

That night he makes it a point to reread that day’s chapter in history even though it’s boring as hell, like most of Canadian history.

He has to do the reading in the living room because he keeps getting distracted by the cuff sitting on his nightstand, so then he gets distracted watching Battle of the Blades with his mom, and making fun of the costumes.

Of course, once he gets back into his bedroom, the cuff is the first thing he sees. Brent considers jerking off wearing it again, but it’s a little too creepy. At least yesterday was an accident. He really has to give it back tomorrow, and he should probably be able to look Duncs in the eye when he does it.

Brent tosses the cuff into his backpack, and he spots his good jeans hanging out of a drawer. They aren’t always lucky, but he always seems to be wearing them when he gets lucky. Not that he thinks Duncs will see him in them and know why Brent is wearing them and drag him off to a janitor’s closet somewhere and blow him or anything.

But it couldn’t hurt, right?

Of course, the next morning he oversleeps his alarm and has to rush around like mad in order to get out the door on time. He grabs a long-sleeved henley out of the clean laundry hamper in the basement and pulls it on as he ran up the stairs. By the time he has all his books and stuff gathered and grabs a PopTart to eat on the way, however, he figures it must actually be his brother’s the way it’s pulling across his chest and the sleeves are a little too short. He doesn’t have time to change, so it looks like he’s going to have to live with it for the day.

For once, he manages to catch Duncs at his locker between classes and pulls out the cuff to hand it back.

“Hey, I probably should have returned this a lot sooner, but better late than never, right?”

“Oh. Thanks.” Duncs takes it with a confused look on his face. Brent tries not to focus on the way his thumb rubs over the leather absently.

“I didn’t want you to think I was stealing your stuff or anything. And you might need it the next time you want to go out moshing looking like a badass.” Shut up, Jesus Christ he tells himself mentally. “Anyway, I’ll see you at lunch, right?”

“Hmm?” Duncs looks up to meet his eyes. “Oh, yeah, I guess.”

His eyes are like, really blue. Brent is actually glad when the bell rings before he can say something stupid. “Gotta go, but see you at lunch,” Brent says.

He shouldn’t be surprised that Duncs put the cuff on, but there it is, reaching out for one of Troy’s fries when Brent sits down for lunch. He’s pretty sure he can feel the blood rushing out of his head and down towards his dick. The table will hide any embarrassing boners, but it’s still really inconvenient.

Brent has finished his sandwich before he realizes Duncs is doing that thing where he talks to everyone but Brent again. He’s barely even looking at him, and Brent knows he looks good. He caught the lunch lady checking him out, but Duncs is acting like he’s invisible.

“So what are you doing this weekend, Duncs?” Brent asks.

“Uh, we’ve got a game Saturday in Victoria, some of the guys are going to be staying over before we carpool to the Ferry in the morning.”

“Oh,” Brent says, more than a little disappointed. “Well good luck, yeah?”

Duncs just nods and goes back to poking at his macaroni and cheese.

“Try not to suffer any key injuries before the rematch next week,” Fraz says, tossing a napkin at him. “No excuses for when we beat your asses this time.”

“Wait, what?” Brent says.

“We play Langley next week,” Ladd says. “Do you ever look at the schedule?”

“Yeah, like at the beginning of the year,” Brent says. “I just like to focus on the immediate game, and not get caught looking ahead.”

No one is buying that. “Fuck off, I’ve been…busy.”

“Busy shrinking all your shirts?” Ladd asks, grinning.

Brent glares at him. “It’s Keith’s.”

“Oh, really?” Fraz leers between him and Duncs, and there are several more giggles and waggling eyebrows around the table.

“My brother, you assholes.” Brent can’t stop the blush he feels rising on his cheeks, nor can he help thinking for a moment about what it would actually mean to be wearing Duncs’s clothes. For his part, Duncs is laughing it off, but Brent thinks the tips of his ears look redder than usual, and he still won’t look at Brent.

History is more of the same, like, Duncs will do or say the bare minimum to Brent but then turn or look away. He’s not ignoring Brent, he’s just acting like he doesn’t care.

Brent isn’t just going to take that though, so as the period is ending he leans half out of his chair until he’s leaning against Duncs and wow, has he always smelled this good? Brent pauses to think and comes up with ‘yes’. Dammit.

“Did you want something?” Duncs asks looking at Brent from the corner of his eye.

“You- Uh. Do you wanna hang out after school?”

“Can’t, practice,” Duncs says. He drops his pencil and has to lean away from Brent to pick it up.

“Oh right, yeah, gotta beat Victoria,” Brent says retreating to his seat.

By the end of the week Brent is about ready to scream at the way Duncs is still freezing him out. He guesses this is simply how their friendship is going to be now, and it sucks. Dammit, he misses hanging out with Duncs, and would even without the fact that now he wants to rub up against him and kiss him out behind the practice rink.

In some of his mopier moments Brent thinks it’s unfair of Duncs to still be so mad at him over one drunken bad idea that he’s apologized for like a hundred times already, but he guesses it probably felt like Brent was mocking Duncs’s gayness or something, especially after he’d promised he wouldn’t tell anybody at Delta about it.

He spends the weekend hanging out with the guys, playing hockey and shooting the shit. They win their game Saturday afternoon, so everyone’s in a good mood, roughhousing and chilling at Fraz’s place after the game.

Brent is just glad it’s not a big party thing. He’s not in the right mindset for that after this past week. He wishes Duncs were here, but it’s probably for the best that he’s just got his team with him.

Someone puts on Strange Brew and passes Brent another beer, but he finds himself falling asleep even before Bob and Doug reach Elsinore.

He has to scrub the Sharpie off his face in the morning before he goes home. He’s almost afraid of the pictures that are going to end up on Facebook. There’s nothing too bad, yet, but he’s easily in the best shape of the rest of the team, so he keeps an eye on his news feed over most of the afternoon.

Duncan Keith is now friends with Logan Couture. He doesn’t think anything of it, until Sharpy comments on it, “Way to go, Duncs.”

He clicks through to Logan’s profile, but he doesn’t have a lot of information public to people who aren’t his friends. It just says he lives in Victoria and likes hockey and The Hangover. He looks kind of doofy in his profile pic, in Brent’s opinion.

He forces himself to stop stalking Duncs’s friends and start working on his homework, but his mind keeps turning over the implications of Sharpy being so excited about Duncs making new friends.

He’s proud of himself for not asking Duncs about it on Monday. Of course, the only reason he doesn’t is that he isn’t sure how to bring it up. “So hey, since you blew me off this weekend I was stalking your Facebook-”

But then Tuesday night after practice he notices a new exchange on Duncs’s wall.

“Have a game on the mainland Saturday morning, we should do something after, if you’re free.”

“I can make time :)”

And that’s just fucking weird. He’s never seen Duncs use one of those smiley faces before. It kind of freaks Brent out. He’s pretty sure they’re planning a date, and if he can figure that out, so could someone else reading.

It’s not fair that Duncs is being so obvious like a week after he got all mad at Brent for almost outing him.

Wednesday at lunch starts out quiet, as they all concentrate on shoveling food in their mouths, until Fraser arrives and plunks his tray down with a purpose.

“Don Angelo’s has triple sausage pizza on the menu again. Anyone who’s not there at 6:30 tonight is worthless as a human being,” he announces triumphantly.

The news is greeted with extreme enthusiasm around the table, except by Duncs, who looks curiously at them while chewing his sandwich.

“Duncs, Don Angelo’s,” Ladd says. “Have you seriously never been there?”

Duncs shakes his head. “I take it it’s good?”

“Dude, I can’t even tell you. It looks like just a pizza joint in a strip mall, but I would choose a slice of that pizza over the love of my own mother. And triple sausage is the best of them all.”

“If God made a pizza, he would wish it were as good as triple sausage,” Troy chimes it.

Duncs is laughing a little at this point, but he willingly agrees to try this divine pizza for himself. And if he seems to glance at Brent for a long moment as he does, well, it turns out he does have a smear of ketchup around his mouth, so it was probably just that.

Brent tries to just let himself enjoy the simple joy of his triple sausage slice, but Duncs is just really distracting. They’re all wedged into a booth, the cheap vinyl creaking every time they move, and Duncs is pressed up against his side so Troy doesn’t go falling off the edge at the outside.

Brent doesn’t know what he does to his hair or his clothes to make them smell that good, but it’s really unfair.

“Did you just sniff me?” Duncs asks.

“What?” Brent says. “No, dude, I’m just enjoying the aromas of this fine establishment.”

“Uh, okay.”

“So what do you think, Duncs?” Fraz asks. “Everything we promised and more?”

“It’s really good,” Duncs agrees.

Normally, Brent would object to that kind of understatement, but it’s Duncs. And he’s got more objectionable things on his mind. “You should bring some of your guys here after we kick your asses on Saturday. It’ll be our apology gift, sharing with them the wonder of Don Angelo’s.”

It’s kind of a shitty move, but he just wants to know what lie Duncs will tell about his date that night. And it’s not like Brent is supposed to even know about it, so it’s not even an unreasonable suggestion.

Duncs just shakes his head and takes another huge bite of pizza. “Can’t. Meeting up with a friend who’s gonna be in town for the day.”

And that just irritates Brent even more, because it’s technically the truth, as far as he knows. He scowls and pushes the rest of his pizza away. Ladd looks at him like he’s slightly crazy, which at this point he just might be.

“Oh yeah?” Fraz asks Duncs, oblivious to Brent’s internal turmoil. “Like from out where you used to live?”

“Nah, Victoria. We’re gonna hit up this metal record store in Vancity, I think.”

Duncs doesn’t seem at all concerned discussing his maybe-boyfriend with everyone, and Brent doesn’t really understand it. If he doesn’t care if the guys know he’s into dudes, why did he freak out so much at the party?

“Can’t handle that much meat?” Ladd asks, pointing at Brent’s slice.

“My stomach hurts,” Brent says. It’s kind of true, at least.

“Maybe if you hadn’t wolfed down three already,” Duncs says. He’s got sauce on his chin.

“Yeah, well at least it all went in my mouth,” Brent says.

“Huh?” Duncs asks. He wipes ineffectually at his cheeks.

“Missed it,” Brent says. “Here, just-” he turns Duncs’s head to face him and rubs at the spot with his thumb. Duncs holds perfectly still and looks up at Brent from under his eyelashes. Brent has to hold his breath because he’s not sure what to do next and he just wants to keep touching Duncs and his thumb is really near Duncs’s lip and-

“So can I have yours?” Fraz asks, already reaching for Brent’s slice.

“What?” Brent asks, letting go of Duncs suddenly. “No!” he slaps Fraz’s hand away.

He’s tired of people taking the things he wants.

Eventually all the pizza is gone and the waitress has stopped coming by to offer free refills of their Cokes, so they figure it’s time to head out before they’re kicked out. There’s the usual scrambling to come up with cash and figure the tip and by the time it’s all squared away, Duncs has bolted with hardly a good bye to anyone, and definitely not one to Brent.

Brent tries to immerse himself in the conversation with his friends who are at least still talking to him, as they kick the curb outside the restaurant in order to avoid having to split up and go home. No one seems to think Duncs was acting weird at dinner, and when he brings it up Fraz gives him a weird look.

“Duncs is always weird, dude. That’s like, his thing.”

At least Saturday is coming up.

He’s amped for the game. So’s the rest of the team after what happened at the invitational, but Brent especially so. The Lancers apparently feel the same, because it’s a physical game from the get go.

The hits are coming hard and fast and puck battles are brutal against the boards. He lays a big hit on Duncs when he pinches too far in and almost mutters a “sorry,” but he just spent the last two shifts on the bench scanning the crowd trying to figure out if that Logan guy is here.

He’s trying not to think about that on the ice, and it’s kind of easy because Sharpy is in Brent’s face every chance he gets. Brent does his best to shove him off without losing his focus, but Sharpy just keeps coming back for more.

A puck whistled dead after it ends up under the Langley goalie predictably leads to an all out scrum, and Brent ends up tangled with Sharp yet again. Sharpy shoves him hard into the side of the net, and won’t let him regain his balance while the refs are busy pulling everyone else apart.

“Dude, what is your problem?” Brent shoves back, trying to get a little space between them.

“You, asshole.” He keeps glaring at Brent even after the ref skates in between them and tells them to get off the ice for the next faceoff.

He can’t think of anything he’s done during the game to piss Sharpy off, but these days that doesn’t necessarily mean he hasn’t.

The refs miss at least three hooking, slashing and cross check calls on Sharp before the end of the period. Brent is getting more than a little pissed off. He glares at the Langley players as they file off the ice for intermission and sees Sharp and Duncs laughing it up. His fists clench inside his gloves.

“Fuck those guys.”

“For sure,” Ladd agrees. Brent hadn’t even realized he’d spoken loud enough for anyone to hear him. “Though letting Sharp beat you up is a great way to keep him tied up and away from good scoring chances.”

“What’d you do to him, anyway?” Fraz asks.

“Nothing!” Brent says. “Or if I did it was an accident and he’s losing his shit over nothing.”

“Maybe he’ll cool off before the next period,” Brouwer says before their coach calls them all to attention.

Sharpy does back off him in the opening of the second, but it’s clear that’s coach’s orders and not that he’s any less mad at Brent. Duncs, on the other hand, appears to have spent the intermission betting just how many times he can mash Brent into the boards before the period’s over.

After one particularly solid hit just at Brent’s blue line, Duncs doesn’t let up even when the puck skitters out of the zone and is picked up by Richards, who skates it full speed toward the other zone. Brent pushes back, but Duncs just shoves him again, physically blocking them both from moving up to join the play.

“What, you wanna go?” Brent asks, more out of frustration than any expectation that they’ll actually fight.

But Duncs looks at him and snaps, “Fine,” before flicking his gloves off and circling up away from the boards.

Brent wasn’t actually expecting Duncs to accept, so he’s a second behind dropping his gloves and pulling off his helmet.

They just circle each other at first, grabbing at each other’s jerseys. Brent isn’t really that sold on the idea of hitting Duncs, and he figures they’ll just dance until the refs break them up or one of them hits a rut, and they fall to the ice.

So it’s kind of a surprise when Duncs comes up with a left and clips him on the cheek.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Brent asks. “Showing off for-” he cuts himself off before he says “your boyfriend,” because he’s not that much of a dick. But he’s not too nice to not punch Duncs right on the mouth.

And if it makes things uncomfortable for Duncs later, Brent won’t be bothered by it.

“Wrong with me?” Duncs asks incredulously. “You! You-”

He sends another left Brent’s way, but Brent dodges most of it and sends another one back at Duncs.

They stumble then, and the refs rush in to break it up. Brent wishes they hadn’t, because Duncs never finished his sentence and probably never will.

“Good job, Seabsie,” Ladd says as he brings him his discarded gear in the penalty box.

“Thanks,” he replies, even though he doesn’t feel as good as he probably should.

He looks over at Duncs in his penalty box, but he’s conspicuously checking his pads and searching for a water bottle, not looking back at Brent. For the whole 5 minutes they sit there Brent has a hard time concentrating on the game, and it’s not just because of the throbbing in his cheek.

Just before they’re let out, while they’re both standing at the door of their boxes, Duncs does glance over at him, and their eyes meet for a long moment. Brent doesn’t know what expression Duncs has on under his helmet, and he doesn’t have time to figure it out before they’re back out in the heat of the game.

The period is winding down with both goalies blocking everything they see. An attempt at clearing the puck takes an awkward bounce off the boards and lands right in the feet of Patrick Kane who starts carrying it past the hash marks. He shoots a pass towards Sharp, who’s waiting on the opposite side of the crease, but Brent manages to get his stick into the passing lane and deflect it out to Troy who carries it easy out of the zone and up the ice for a breakaway with Fraz at his side.

The Lancer forwards can’t get back in time to help out Duncs and his D partner, and when Fraz crashes the net, Barker ends up screening his own goalie, so he has no idea where the puck is coming from when Troy wrists it in.

The final minute of the period is a scramble as the Lancers try to keep momentum from leaving them entirely before they head back to the locker room for intermission, but the Vipers are able to hold them at bay.

As they file into their stalls during the break all of Brent’s teammates offer him fist bumps and congratulations for his fight, along with demands for a play-by-play of how it went down. Neither Duncs nor Brent are known for their pugilistic natures, so it must have been more than just a routine fight.

“What happened, man?” asks Troy as he retapes a sock that’s been slipping. “Did you sleep with his mom last night? They’re pissed as hell at you, dude.”

Brent shrugs. I drunkenly offered to kiss him and now he has a boyfriend to spite me, is probably not going to cut it as an explanation.

“I dunno. They just really want to win, I guess.”

“Ha, good luck with that,” Fraz smirks, and the conversation drifts to the goal and how to keep it up for the final period.

The third period is much more like the last two games the teams played than it is the last two periods. The Lancers have given up their vendetta against Brent and are just doing everything they can to tie the game.

They come damn close a few times, the crossbar and posts ring loudly as shots bank off them, but they never get any of their chances through.

Brent blocks more than his share of shots — he’s going to be a giant bruise tomorrow — because winning this game seems so much more personal than usual. When the final buzzer sounds, he and the Vipers celebrate like they’ve won some kind of trophy, and not just a Saturday afternoon game.

Back in the locker room it’s Brent who suggests the team finds somewhere they can get hammered in celebration tonight. He has absolutely no desire to be sober tonight, because being sober means thinking about Duncs out on the town with his secret boyfriend, and maybe being brought home later and consoled on the loss.

Troy is happy enough to volunteer his basement, and they’re all packing up to head out there when Brent’s phone buzzes. It’s a text from Duncs.

“What was with you out there?” and really? What was with him? He wasn’t the one getting up in his face and starting fights. Whatever, he can’t deal with this right now. He needs to be drunk five minutes ago. He tosses his phone into his bag and goes to see if he can catch a ride with Ladd.

He’s double fisting from pretty much the second he walks in the door. The guys just keep passing him drinks the second he finishes one until he can barely hold himself upright. Ladd and Brouw start taking the drinks out of his hands.

He’d fight them, but his arms feel heavy and don’t move the way he wants them to. That sets off a few laughs.

“Lucky you had better moves this afternoon, eh?” Troy says.

“Duncs would flatten him in this state,” Ladd laughs.

Brent doesn’t laugh. “He hit me. Duncs hit me.”

“Yeah, buddy, that’s what happens in a fight,” Fraz says. “But you got him back good.”

“Right in the mouth,” Brent agrees. “He won’t be kissing anyone tonight.”

“…I guess not,” Troy says, clearly confused as to where that came from.

“Come on,” Ladd says, throwing an arm around Brent’s shoulders. “Let’s get you someplace where you won’t injure yourself when you pass out.”

“Not gonna pass out,” Brent protests, but he follows willingly enough when Ladd leads him over to the ratty, unused couch in the corner. It’s wedged weirdly under the basement steps, but it’s fine for sprawling on if you don’t sit up too straight.

Brent isn’t tired at all, and he’s bored, and everyone’s all in the parts of the room you can stand up in, and it smells like a locker room over here.

When he turns his head to the side, he sees why; Ladd has dropped his bag on the floor and it’s stinking right next to his head. Brent appreciates the thoughtfulness, too many times he’s gotten a ride home with one guy when his bag is in someone else’s car, but not the positioning.

He reaches down to bat the bag down a few feet when he remembers his phone is in there. Since no one here is going to talk to him, too busy playing MarioKart (lame) and Edward 40 hands (awesome), he should talk to someone not here.

The text from Duncs is still sitting in his inbox, but Brent’s thumbs are too big to handle the little buttons right now, so he just calls.

It takes Duncs a while to pick up, maybe he’s asleep? Brent doesn’t know how late it is. Maybe he’s too busy doing things with Logan-

Fortunately, Duncs answers before Brent can finish that thought. “H’lo?”

“You punched me in the face.”

“What?” Duncs apparently needs a moment to catch up to the conversation. “It was a fight. You punched me too.” He sounds tired, maybe Brent did wake him up.

“But you punched me first! Why did you punch me?” He can tell he sounds petulant, but being this drunk means he doesn’t have to care.

Duncs sighs. “You sound pretty smashed, maybe we should talk about it later.”

“No! Because you don’t ever talk to me anymore and I want to know.”

“Seabs-”

“And I said I was sorry for wanting to kiss you.” And okay, maybe that wasn’t exactly how it happened but he really hates Duncs being mad at him.

“Sorry, what?” Duncs asks.

“You should be,” Brent grouses. “And what’s so great about this Logan guy that you want to kiss him instead? He has a stupid nose.”

“No, wait, Seabs, back up-” Duncs tries.

But Brent keeps talking, because he has a lot he needs to say. “And why’d you have to sic Sharpy on me? It’s not like I’ve been creepy about it.” He pauses. “Okay, a little creepy, but I cleaned your bracelet real well, I don’t know how you could tell.”

“Seabs!” Duncs shouts. His voice sounds kind of strangled.

“You don’t have to shout, reception isn’t that bad down here.”

“Go back. What the hell are you talking about?”

“I just don’t know why you hate me now.”

Duncs makes a noise very much like he’s choking.

“I don’t hate you, Seabs. I really don’t hate you. I just… You really wanted to kiss me that night?”

“I always want to kiss you,” Brent mumbles, because how can Duncs not know that?

“But-but you’re not gay, you slept with Kelsey Ford!”

“So?” Brent doesn’t see what that has to do with anything.

“If you wanted to kiss me, why didn’t you?” Duncs’s voice sounds smaller now and Brent presses his ear even closer to the phone.

“You ran away! And then you were mad at me and wouldn’t talk to me, even when I looked really hot, and then you had a date with that dork from the island.”

“He’s not a- and it wasn’t really a date. Or it was, but I didn’t-”

Duncs is quiet for a second, and Brent listens to him take a big breath in and out.

“I wish we weren’t having this conversation on the phone,” he finally says.

Brent glances out across the room where there party is still going loud and strong. “Yeah, but I’m way too drunk to drive.”

“I think this would probably be better to do when we’re both sober,” Duncs says. He at least has the decency to sound disappointed.

“Probably,” Brent sighs. The time between now and sobriety feels like approximately a thousand years.

“Maybe I could pick you up tomorrow?” Duncs offers. “We could get breakfast?”

“Yes,” Brent agrees immediately. “But uh-”

“Not too early?” Duncs asks. It sounds like he’s smiling. Brent hopes he’s smiling.

“Yeah,” Brent says.

“So I’ll see you tomorrow,” Duncs says. “Go have fun at your party.”

Brent maneuvers his way off the couch and back out to the rest of the guys. It’s amazing how much more fun things are when he’s not trying to drink until his brain stops working.

He hangs around long enough to sober back up to the “able to feel his face” level of drunk before catching a ride with Fraz, who quit drinking pretty early because his mom is dragging him to church in the morning.

Collapsing into his bed is about all he’s good for when he gets home, so he wakes up the next morning with his belt buckle digging into his stomach and his shirt twisted up round his armpits. He’s just brushing the dead goat taste out of his mouth when Duncs shows up with two large coffees and a greasy paper bag emblazoned with the Tim Hortons logo. Brent has never been more attracted to him.

He hopes Duncs knows that’s what that indistinct noise meant when he took the cup from his hand.

His parents and Keith are all home, so he leads Duncs up to his room for privacy. Had he been thinking, he would’ve made sure it was clean first, or suggested they go for a drive or something. He kicks a few clothes under the bed before dropping back down on it.

Duncs hesitates a moment before taking the desk chair. Yeah, a drive probably would’ve been a better choice. Neither of them say anything at first. For a while, Brent is glad that Duncs is letting him commune with the coffee, but as the caffeine kicks in and he wakes up some more, the silence starts to shift from easy to awkward.

“Um,” Brent tries.

“You remember calling last night, right?” Duncs asks. He’s picked up a beat up Han Solo action figure off Brent’s desk and is fiddling with the arms.

“I didn’t drink that much,” Brent replies. That just gets an eyebrow. “I remember.” He tries not to cringe outwardly when he remembers some of what he said. “Sorry for insulting your boyfriend.”

Duncs worries the corner of his lip in his teeth. “He’s not my boyfriend. How did you even know about that, anyway?”

“Facebook, duh. You pretty much told everyone you were going on a date with him.”

Duncs ducks his head and puts Han Solo back on the desk.

“I thought… I thought that maybe if I tried dating someone else I’d quit being so hung up on you.”

Brent twists the lid of his coffee cup around the rim. “Yeah?”

Duncs smiles ruefully. “It didn’t work.”

Brent can’t help the grin that starts to spread over his face then, but he figures Duncs doesn’t mind. He stands up and sets his coffee down on his bedside table as he makes his way over to Duncs, but Duncs doesn’t stand up to meet him.

“I really thought you weren’t gay.”

Brent scratches at his day old stubble. “Well, I’m not, I guess. I mean, I don’t like, think about it a whole bunch. I like girls, but I also like making out with dudes sometimes.” He blushes. “I definitely like you.”

His blush deepens as he suddenly catches sight of Duncs’s wrist, where he’s wearing the cuff he lent to Brent and that Brent… had to clean.

Duncs must follow his sightline, because then he’s turning the cuff with his other hand. “You ever going to tell me what happened with this?”

Brent was hoping he wouldn’t have to. “Can I- um, can I kiss you, first?” Because if Duncs thinks he’s the creepiest after Brent tells him, he’d at least like to have that.

It’s Duncs’s turn to flush. “Yeah, I mean. Yeah.”

Brent grins then, and there’s an awkward minute where he stoops down to Duncs’s height as Duncs stand and they jostle for position. He’s reminded of why he usually only ever hooks up while drunk, but this is Duncs. It’s better than a drunken hook up.

But then Duncs’s hand falls to Brent’s hip and it’s the easiest thing in the world to lean in and press their lips together. It’s chaste to start and Brent is doing a fist pump in his head, but when he presses into the kiss to take it further, Duncs hisses and pulls his head back.

“What? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-” Brent babbles. Fuck, he didn’t think he’d fuck up this quickly. And Duncs said-

Duncs’s hands tighten on Brent’s hips. “It’s okay, just a little banged up still.” His tongue darts out to poke the sore looking spot on his lip — the spot where Brent hit him yesterday.

“Well that backfired,” Brent mumbles.

“Huh?” Duncs asks.
“Huh what?” Duncs’s tongue is really distracting.

“What backfired?”

“Oh. Uh, I may have aimed for your mouth in the fight. So you couldn’t kiss Logan.”

Duncs laughs a little. “Well, thanks so much for that.”

He flicks his tongue at the bruise one more time and that’s pretty much all Brent can take. He pulls Duncs closer with a hand on the small of his back, and kisses at the other corner of his mouth. Duncs responds by wrapping an arm around Brent’s shoulder and licking at his bottom lip. Their hips aren’t quite touching, but Brent can feel their pants brushing when they shift.

He’s holding back a little, trying not to push too much too fast, but Duncs pulls him closer and Brent goes easily, maybe more easily than Duncs was expecting, because he has to take a step back and ends up bumping into the desk chair, sending it skittering across the floor and startling them both.

“Um, we could move this,” Brent says, gesturing his head towards his bed. “We don’t have to — I mean. This is good. Really good.”

“Yeah,” Duncs says quickly, nudging Brent back that way. Neither of them want to let go, so it’s a weird shuffle step until Brent feels his mattress hit the back of his legs. He sits and reaches up for Duncs.

“God, I’ve been dying for this,” Brent says.

Duncs huffs a little as he moves in between Brent’s knees. “I’ve been waiting longer.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Brent asks, his fingers starting to wander under the hem of Duncs’s shirt. They could’ve been doing this for weeks.

“I was trying,” Duncs’s says, his hand now resting right at Brent’s hair line. It should tickle, but it really doesn’t. “But then Kelsey Ford interrupted us.”

Brent winces. “Yeah, that night could have gone better.”

Duncs thumb sweeps across the bruise on his cheek, and Brent has to bite his lip to keep from shivering. He pushes his fingers further up under Duncs’s shirt, feeling the flat planes of his stomach and the goosebumps that spring up in his path.

Duncs tilts his face up to kiss him, and Brent does his best to close the gap between them. It’s soft and gentle, and Brent feels kind of like a girl in this position, but it’s good.

It can’t be good for Duncs’s spine though, all hunched over like that, so Brent pulls him down until he’s lying on his back with Duncs on top of him. It’s pretty much the greatest thing that’s ever happened to him, and he lets his hands wander under Duncs’s shirt. He tries not to apply too much pressure since he can’t see the bruises from yesterday’s game, and he’s not going to do anything that makes Duncs stop kissing him, even for a second.

Duncs is heavy between Brent’s spread legs, and it feels amazing. He tucks an ankle around Duncs’s calf and feels him flex his foot in return. Duncs lets a hand rest on Brent’s chest, slowly drawing it down to palm at Brent’s side. He can feel the warmth of Duncs’s fingers through the thin material of his t-shirt, and he can’t believe how such a simple thing can turn him on so much.

He brings a hand up to tangle in Duncs’s hair — it’s really soft — and Duncs hums into Brent’s mouth, tilting his head into Seabs’s grasp.

He can feel Duncs’s dick pressing against the inside of his thigh, and all the blood rushes out of his brain and into his cock. It’s been on high alert ever since Duncs walked into his bedroom, and this pretty much puts it over the top. He doesn’t think he’s been this hard since Karen Andrews let him touch under her bikini top at her pool party between 9th and 10th grade.

He can’t help rubbing his thigh just a little bit against Duncs’s erection. He knows he said they didn’t have to, just because they were on the bed, but if Duncs wants to Brent isn’t going to say no.

The way Duncs gasps against his mouth is nothing but encouragement, so Brent does it again and this time Duncs grinds against him.

“Wait, Brent, wait,” Duncs says, pulling back a few inches. Brent doesn’t like that he’s so far away. “Have you ever, I mean, with a guy have you ever done anything like this?”

Nothing he does with Duncs feels like anything he’s done before. “Do handjobs with Ladd count?” he asks.

Duncs blinks at him before dropping his head to Brent’s shoulder. “Your team is so much gayer than mine.”

“Told you you should’ve joined us,” Brent says. “But we were like fourteen and my hair was awful then. Best you didn’t see it.”

Duncs mumbles something that sounds like “Then?” against Brent’s jaw but then he starts kissing there, so Brent doesn’t have a chance to get offended.

Duncs keeps kissing Brent’s jaw and down his throat, scraping his teeth a little in a way that’s making Brent feel like he’s plugged into an electrical socket.

“What about you?” he asks, sounding more than a little breathless.

Duncs stops kissing his neck to meet his eyes, and Brent immediately regrets interrupting that feeling by asking.

“Me?” Duncs appears to have lost the thread of the conversation a little. “Oh, I’ve dated a couple guys. We, you know, did stuff. Is that okay?”

“That’s great,” Brent says, tilting his neck invitingly, so maybe Duncs will get back to it.

Duncs has a better idea first and starts pushing Brent’s shirt up to his arm pits, and Brent quickly tugs it off over his head. Duncs leans back in, targeting Brent’s collar bone, but Brent catches him.

“You too. I want to see you.”

Duncs grins and sits up, pulling the shirt up slowly like he’s some kind of professional at this. His muscles stretch and strain, and Brent can’t keep his hands off. There’s so much bare skin he needs to touch and see and explore.

Duncs collapses back on top of Brent, like he can’t keep his hands off either. They kiss again, and any of the gentleness of earlier is gone. They’re both pressing into the kisses eagerly, clutching at each other and pulling as close as they can get. The feel of Duncs’s bare chest against his own makes Brent gasp and thrust up, wanting to feel as much of him as possible.

“God, Seabs,” Duncs breathes, pressing him down into the mattress. His chest is flushed and blotchy and his hair is getting damp at the temples, and Brent doesn’t think he’s ever seen anything sexier.

“You are so hot, you know that, right?” Brent breathes. “You’ve been driving me crazy with your mouth, and your eyes, and your neck.” His hands trace the path of his words as he watches Duncs’s blush go down past his collar bone.

Duncs bites on his lip. It’s already swollen from the kissing and the cut. “Could I- would you mind if-” he’s blushing again, but he sets his shoulders back and looks Brent straight in the eye. “I wanna blow you.”

Brent’s whole body jerks at the words, and the idea and, “Yes, yeah, yeah. Uh, maybe lock the door first?”

The last thing he wants is his brother, or worse his mom, interrupting this. And he could use an extra thirty seconds to get himself under control.

Duncs nods and climbs off of Brent. Brent misses the weight and the warmth of him, but he takes the opportunity to shuck off his jeans. His hands hesitates at the elastic of his boxers.

“No wait,” Duncs says after clicking the lock shut. “Let me.”

He crawls back onto the bed and hooks his fingers under the waistband. He doesn’t immediately pull them down though, instead he kisses over Brent’s hip and licks across the line where his hair starts to come in thicker and curlier. Brent’s erection, tenting his boxers, brushes the underside of Duncs’s chin and he has to dig his fingers into the sheets to avoid embarrassing himself.

Duncs slowly pulls the boxers down Brent’s hips, still kissing down the crease of his thigh.

“Duncs, please,” Brent pants, grabbing at his own hip to avoid grabbing at Duncs’s head and pushing him down instead. “I can’t — you have to —”

Duncs looks up at him from between his legs, and finally pulls his underwear all the way off.

He’s already leaking pre-come, and almost whimpers when Duncs wraps his hand around Brent’s cock and smears it a little bit. He could chew through his lip right now and not even notice because all of his nerves have moved to his dick. And fuck, he’s still wearing that fucking leather cuff, the one Brent — fuck, he can’t think about that right now, not if he’s not going to blow it all the second Duncs puts his mouth on Brent’s cock.

“Duncs,” he whines, and luckily Duncs gets it. He quits torturing Brent and steers Brent’s dick into his mouth.

He just takes the tip at first, sucking gently as he works the rest of Brent with his hand, before slowly taking more and more in. It’s hot, and wet, and Duncs’s tongue never stops moving, and Brent has to dig his fingers into his hips to keep from thrusting into his mouth or pulling at Duncs’s hair the way he’s been imagining for weeks.

Duncs doesn’t let up, setting up a steady rhythm that has Brent holding his breath at how good it is. He’s not really trying anything fancy, but it just builds and builds in Brent’s dick, and the base of his spine, and all the way out to his fingertips.

One of Duncs’s hands slides up to cover Brent’s, gentling his grip where his nails have left little half-moon marks. Brent turns his hand to grasp at Duncs’s fingers, and that’s all the warning he gets out before he’s coming, Jesus Christ, down Duncs’s throat, and Duncs is swallowing it, and that’s about all the information his brain can handle for a while.

Brent just slumps back onto his mattress and waits for his brain to reboot. He’s vaguely aware of Duncs getting off his knees — that shorts him out again — and crawling up onto the bed next to him.

He’s lost his jeans at some point and their bare thighs are touching. Duncs takes unfair advantage of this fact and what it’s doing to Brent to ask again, “So what’s with you and the cuff?”

“I jerked off wearing it, and pretended it was your hand,” Brent mumbles against Duncs’s shoulder.

Duncs hisses at that. “Yeah?” he asks. “And that — that did it for you?”

“Oh yeah,” Brent says. “But then I kind of got jizz on it, and had to figure out how to clean it before returning it to you.”

Duncs is making breathy moans, and there’s a tell tale sound of skin on skin. Brent cracks open his eyes to see Duncs stroking himself and immediately bats his hand away. “Hey, hey, hey.”

“Seabs, please,” Duncs whines while Brent licks his palm to slick things up for him.

He hasn’t done this for another guy since that time with Ladd a few years ago, but there’s nothing strange or awkward about it. Pretty much no matter what he does, Duncs likes it, except when Brent slows his strokes to really feel how soft the skin is, or trace the vein on the under side of his cock.

That frustrates Duncs to the point of wrapping his hand tight around Brent’s — tighter than Brent would have gone — and working Brent’s hand over his dick until his hips are jerking into their grip, and he’s moaning so loud Brent has to kiss him to keep anyone else in the house from hearing.

It’s messy when Duncs finally comes, as it spills over both of their hands and fingers, but Brent doesn’t care. He just keeps kissing Duncs and wipes his hand off on his thigh.

Duncs lets his whole weight fall on Brent, and it’s fairly crushing, but it feels good too. Eventually Brent tips him halfway off his chest, because it’s as far as he can be bothered to move him, and not at all because he feels like cuddling.

Duncs grins up at him, and it’s one of the dopiest grins Brent has seen. He’s pretty sure that’s only because he’s not looking in the mirror right now, though.

“Hi,” he says softly.

“Hi.” Duncs hums contentedly, and trails a fingertip lightly down the planes of Brent’s chest, lingering above his belly button. Brent can’t stop the shivers at how it tickles.

“So, that was fun.”

“Yeah,” Duncs agrees, still smiling. Brent wants him to smile like that all the time. Especially when naked in Brent’s bed.

He brushes his thumb across Duncs’s cheek. “You’re going to have some serious beard burn. Sorry. I’ll try to shave next time.”

“I don’t mind,” Duncs says as he leans into Brent’s hand.

Duncs’s phone buzzes somewhere on the floor, but neither of them move.

“Did you need to get that?” Brent asks.

“Nah, probably just Sharpy,” Duncs says.

“Oh, well then you definitely need to text him back and call off your dog. He could be headed for my house right now with a Molotov Cocktail.”

“You’re okay with me telling him?” Duncs asks.

He hasn’t really thought about telling people. He’s never really done anything worth telling people about, or they saw him slip off with whoever at a party and already knew.

“You told him about Logan,” Brent points out. Not that he’s jealous. Logan and his stupid nose are back on the island, while he’s got Duncs here in bed.

It’s not like Sharpy’s going to go around telling everyone, because even if he still hates Brent, that could hurt Duncs too.

“Yeah,” Duncs says. “And well, he kind of already knows about you. He said he caught you checking me out in the locker room?”

Brent flushes. “Oh. Well, maybe a little.”

Duncs smiles at him smugly and stretches across him to dig around on the floor until he comes up with his phone. He smirks at what he reads and taps out a reply before letting it drop back to the ground.

“I take it it was Sharp?”

“Yeah, he wanted to check I didn’t need a convenient excuse to bail.”

“So your house isn’t suddenly on fire, then?”

“I told him he should probably make plans without me for the rest of the day.”

Duncs shimmies his way back fully onto the bed, and Brent is pretty sure the way it makes their torsos rub against each other isn’t entirely an accident.

They stay in Brent’s bed a while longer, totally not cuddling, until his parents start making more noise, and he gets paranoid they’ll somehow open his locked door.

“I’m not like, ashamed,” he assures Duncs as he pulls on a clean shirt, “but the longer they don’t know we’re dating, the longer we’re going to be able to lock the door when you’re over.”

“We’re dating?” Duncs asks.

“You bought me breakfast,” Brent says. He didn’t think it was a huge assumption to make or anything. They’ve been wanting to make out for like, months, and Brent doubts that one blowjob and handjob are going to be enough for them. It’s not enough for him, that’s for sure.

Duncs grins, and Brent can’t help but smile back. “Well shit, if I’d known that’s what it takes-”

Brent shoves him a little, but Duncs just grabs his arm and pulls him in for a kiss.

“Come on, I’ll make you lunch.”

School is basically the worst thing ever. He sees Duncs in the hall before class, but he can’t push him up against his locker and kiss him good morning like he really wants to.  He doesn’t even get a chance to talk to him until lunch.

He sits down in the seat next to Duncs just before Ladd does, and okay, maybe he had to speed walk a little to get there first, but he really wants to sit next to his boyfriend. His boyfriend, who is grinning at him through a mouthful of turkey sandwich.

“Hi,” Brent grins back, knocking their knees together under the table.

Ladd looks back and forth between them, now deprived of a spot, and finally sits on the other side of the table, next to Troy and Fraser.

“Hey,” Duncs says. Brent can see him fighting back a grin as he takes a bite of his sandwich.

“So you two have kissed and made up?” Ladd asks.

Duncs chokes a little on his sandwich, so Brent slaps him on the back and maybe rubs him there, just to make sure he’s okay. “Yeah, we’re good.”

Ladd is still giving him a look and yeah, Brent probably should’ve called him or whatever after Duncs left last night. But he’d kind of forgotten and been tired.

The guys razz Duncs a little about the game, happy to be on this side of it this time around, and then talk inevitably turns to the fight.

“You guys were really going for each other, huh?” says Troy, munching on a fry.

“I guess. I mean, it was a hockey game,” Brent replies.

“That’s a pretty nice shiner you’ve got there,” Fraz adds. “Duncs really got you a good one.”

Brent laughs, and presses gently against his bruise. “He did, yeah. But I caught him pretty good in the mouth.”

Duncs nods sagely. “It’s true.”

Brent wants to press his fingers against that bruise too. It’s been too long since he last got to touch those. “It was a good fight,” he says. “But we’re cool.”

“Oh Seabs, you’ll never be cool,” Fraser says.

“Fuck you, Frazzle Dazzle,” Brent shoots back easily.

The conversation devolves into a series of insults around the table, and Brent drops his hand under the table to hold Duncs’s hand. It’s not even close to what he really wants to be doing right now, but it’s going to have to be enough.

Or maybe not. Brent taps their joined hands against Duncs’s knee, and then announces casually, “Be right back guys, gotta take a piss.”

Duncs squeezes back quickly before Brent lets go and stands up.

“Don’t fall in!” calls Fraz, and Brent flips him off as he heads down the hall.

The bathroom is deserted while everyone is in the lunch room, so he takes a quick leak and is drying his hands when Duncs opens the door and joins him.

Brent laughs. “Why, fancy meeting you here!”

“Hey,” Duncs smiles, sidling up next to him. “Real smooth back there.”

“Oh, you know it, baby,” Brent says, turning to face him.

Duncs wrinkles his nose at the endearment, but he can’t stop a little quirk of his lips, and Brent has to kiss him. He’s been so good all day, surely he deserves a reward.

Duncs puts his hand around that back of Brent’s neck, and they stand there, lips together just feeling, for a few seconds before Duncs pulls back.

“Seabs what-”

“We’re the only ones in here, I checked,” Brent says, resting his forehead against Duncs’s. “And there’s fifteen minutes left before the bell. No one will be in here for like five or ten minutes.”

Duncs still looks wary, but when Brent wraps his arms around Duncs, Duncs moves easily against him.

The softer kisses quickly give away to the kind that mean Brent has to remind his dick that they aren’t getting laid in the school bathroom — awesome as it would be — so he doesn’t realize the door is opening until it’s almost too late.

Fortunately, it’s just Ladd. Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time Ladd has walked in or nearly walked in on Brent making out with someone. So even though Brent is casually fixing his hair, and Duncs is focusing real hard on washing his hands, Ladd stares at them and says, “Holy shit.”

“Um,” Brent says.

“I fucking knew it, Brouwer’s been telling me how gay you were for him for months—”

“Shh!” Brent says; his voice is getting alarmingly loud, and Duncs is looking tense at the sink.

“— but you never said anything. Did you think I was going to freak out? Were you ever going to tell me?”

“No!” Brent says, and Ladd looks like he’s been punched in the gut. “No, not — I mean —”

But Brent doesn’t have a chance to say what he meant, because four other dudes come piling into the bathroom, and Ladd slips out.

“Fuck,” Brent says to the door.

“Yeah,” Duncs says. “But come on, we need to get our bags.” He bumps into Brent — the closest thing to a hug he can give with half the basketball team at the urinals.

They head back to the lunch table where the guys are already packing up their stuff to head to class. Ladd’s out of the cafeteria as soon as he has his stuff together, and Brent can’t catch his eye to make him wait.

Duncs dawdles tossing his tray and grabbing his backpack until he and Brent are almost alone. He broods as they walk down the hall together, and eventually says, “I don’t want your friends to hate you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Brent says with a little more confidence than he feels. “He’s gonna be madder that you’re a Lancer than that you’re a dude.”

Duncs laughs a little, but he’s still quiet as they take their seats in class.

Brent takes out his phone, and covertly sends Ladd a text under his desk.

that didnt come out rite. lemme drive u home n explain”

He watches Ladd read it across the room and soon enough his phone buzzes with a text back.

u owe me timmys too, jsyk

After school he walks with Duncs out to the parking lot, scanning the crowd for Ladd. “Have fun at practice,” he says.

“I will,” Duncs says. “Good luck with Ladd.”

“It’ll be fine,” Brent assures him. “Call me when you get home?”

“Yeah,” Duncs agrees with a little grin. “I better get going.”

“Okay,” Brent says. He wants to kiss him goodbye or hug him or something. Instead he settles for a punch to the shoulder. Duncs smiles again, and punches him back before heading to his truck.

“How romantic,” Ladd says from behind him.

“Fuck off, eh?” Brent says. “Come on, my car’s this way.”

They don’t actually say anything until they get to Tim Hortons, and that’s just for their orders, and the awkward silence is new and weird. Brent can’t remember there ever being one of these before, and he shifts in his seat, watching Ladd out of the corner of his eye as he drives.

He’s pretty sure Ladd doesn’t care about the gay thing, but what if he does? He’s Brent’s best friend, and he doesn’t know what he’d do if — it’d just really suck.

“So when were you planning on telling me?” Ladd asks after Brent pays at the drive through window.

“I hadn’t really thought about it,” Brent admits. It just all happened so fast, and he’d been moping all week and then yesterday … he’d been distracted.

“You didn’t think you should tell your best friend, ‘Oh by the way, I’m gay now?’”

“I’m not like … gay gay. I still like girls, I’m just also gay for Duncs.”

“And Chris Pronger.”

“Well, yeah,” Brent says. “But you knew about that one.”

“Troy’s been bugging me for like, a month, asking me what’s up with you two, and like an idiot I said nothing, and meanwhile you’ve been making out in bathrooms, and you didn’t even tell me,” Ladd says.

“It was kind of sudden!” Brent protests.

Ladd snorts. “Yeah, whatever. But why didn’t you tell me after? Like, dude, it’s been weeks.”

“What?” Brent asks. “No dude, it’s been like, thirty hours.” Not that he’s counting.

“Bullshit.”

“I’m serious.” Brent runs his hand over the back of his neck. “I kind of drunk dialed him at the party on Saturday, and then yesterday he came over and we, you know, talked it out.”

Ladd raises an eyebrow in his direction.

“…And fooled around some,” Brent admits.

“He any good?”

Brent flushes immediately, which makes Ladd laugh at least.

“But still, I thought I’d at least warrant a ‘hey Laddy, I think I want into Duncan Keith’s pants,’” Ladd says.

“Yeah, no, you totally do, I was just — it was embarrassing. I figured out I wanted to right after he got really pissed at me, and I didn’t want to tell anyone,” Brent says. “I should have though. You’re my best friend, and probably would’ve helped straighten things out sooner.”

Because talking with Duncs yesterday made it clear that Brent is kind of an idiot, but Duncs likes him anyway.

“I don’t think straightening is really what you wanted, Seabs,” Ladd says.

“That was awful, Andy,” Brent says.

“You’d be lost without me,” Ladd says. “And for the love of god, don’t call me that.”

Brent grins. “So, are we good?”

“Yeah,” Ladd says. “Yeah, we’re good.”

Brent relaxes back into his seat.

“Now, unless you want the entire school to find out about you two, I’d suggest not making out in the bathrooms at school. Or bathrooms anywhere, really, because that’s gross. But if you’re going to, at least lock the door.”

Brent nods wryly. “It’s just, you know…”

“You can’t keep your hands out of his pants.”

Brent acknowledges that this is pretty much the case. He finally starts taking in the scenery he’s driving by, and has to make a sudden and slightly illegal left turn in order not to miss Ladd’s street. He pulls up in front of his drive and puts the car in park.

“I’d invite you in,” Ladd says, “but I’m pretty sure you have a date with Duncs to do more than punching him on the arm.”

Brent grins. “Yeah, kind of. But like later, you and me need to hang.”

“Bros before hos,” Ladd says.

“I’m telling Duncs you called him that.”

He doesn’t, actually, because when Duncs swings by on his way home from practice they just end up making out in his truck. It’s less comfortable than the bathroom, but also way less gross.

“So Ladd’s okay with this? With us?” Duncs asks when Brent finally stops monopolizing his mouth to focus on his jaw and his neck. He can smell the soap from when Duncs showered after practice, and his hair is still a little damp. Brent wishes he was still a little naked.

“Yeah, yeah, he’s fine. Thinks we’re idiots, but it’s not a gay thing,” Brent says to a spot behind Duncs’s ear. Duncs shivers a little and Brent can’t help but grin.

“Good, uh, good. Sharpy says he needs to talk to you.”

Brent pulls back a little.

“Am I going to get beat up?”

Duncs makes a small protesting noise, and threads his hand through the hair at the back of Brent’s head.

“You’ll be fine. He doesn’t punch as hard as you, anyway.” He kisses Brent, and suddenly imminent interrogation doesn’t seem so pressing.

Eventually it goes from “getting dark” to “fully dark,” and it starts to get cold in the cab of the truck, even with them working up body heat and sharing the warmth.

“I probably have to get home to dinner,” Duncs says reluctantly.

“Yeah. I don’t want to think about how long my mom’s been watching from the window.”

Duncs ducks guiltily and glances toward the house, checking all the windows. Sure enough, Mrs. Seabrook waves at them from the kitchen, making them both blush.

“So, I’m going to enjoy that conversation,” Brent says glumly.

“She’s not going to be mad, is she?”

“Nah, she’ll just want to talk about like, being careful, and not doing it in their bed, and stuff.”

Duncs pulls a face at that. “Oh, god.”

“If I don’t make it to school tomorrow, it’s because I died of embarrassment. Tell Ladd he can have my equipment.”

Brent reaches for the door handle, but pulls back and gives Duncs one quick peck on the lips before he goes.

It’s definitely more awkward than the first sex talk he got, and when he finally escapes to his room it’s just embarrassing to realize that the receipt in the Pharmasave bag with the condoms and the lube is from last month.

Duncs laughs at him for two minutes straight when Brent calls to tell him that. He pretends to be annoyed, but he just likes the sound of Duncs laughing, so he lets it continue.

Nothing Worth Knowing by beatperfume, shoemaster

Series: Extra Curriculars [2]
Fandoms: Hockey RPF
AO3 Categories: M/M
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Andrew Ladd/Ryan Kesler
Characters: Andrew Ladd, Brent Seabrook, Ryan Kesler
Freeform Tags: College AU
Status: Completed
Chapters: 1
Words: 35,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Published: 2011-02-24
Updated: 2011-02-24
Packaged: 2023-12-04 17:14:51
Summary:

Ryan Kesler hates Andrew Ladd on sight. College AU.

Nothing Worth Knowing

Author’s Note:

Follows Extra Curriculars. Things we have taken extreme liberty with: relative ages, all things regarding NCAA hockey, the University of Vermont, geography.

Many thanks to angelsaves for the beta!

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing worth knowing can be taught.

—Oscar Wilde

Ryan Kesler hates Andrew Ladd on sight.

Andrew Ladd is the kind of guy who is loud and confident and a good hockey player. He and Ryan are two of only three freshmen who make the starting line up at University of Vermont. So sure, Ladd’s also good at hockey, but he’s definitely not as good as he thinks he is.

Ladd is good in the locker room, and all the guys like him. Kesler, who has always had trouble interacting with other people off the ice, automatically hates guys like that. It doesn’t help that Ladd is also really good-looking, and he knows he’s good-looking, too, which automatically makes him less attractive.

Ryan’s seen him flirt with everyone he comes in contact with, like that’s supposed to be charming and not just sleazy.

He’s working up a rant in his head about it — one he can’t actually tell anyone because the only guys he really knows in this state are all on the team, and he doesn’t want to be accused of poisoning the locker room — when he hears Alex tell Smitty to “quit being such a fag, dude.”

Ryan doesn’t flinch when people say that shit, not where they can see it, but it still pisses him off. If he throws a roll of tape into his bag harder than is necessary, no one notices, except maybe the tape.

“Dude, cut that shit out,” Ladd says.

“What?” Alex asks.

“The gay jokes and insults, man, that shit’s not cool,” Ladd says easily.

Ryan tenses, waiting for the inevitable cascade of insults and ridicule towards the freshman who thinks anyone cares about his political correctness.

But it doesn’t come.

“Yeah, man, get more creative,” Jonesy calls from his locker.

Ladd grins. “Call him a limp dick, sad sack, asswipe, douchebag, cum stain…”

“Hey hey hey!” Smitty cries, putting his hands up in surrender. “I thought we were friends, man. You’re hurting my feelings over here!”

“Aww, want me to kiss it better?” Ladd asks, taking a few steps towards him.

All he gets is a balled-up sock thrown in his face before everyone laughs and goes back to suiting up.

It shouldn’t make him mad that Ladd’s not a bigoted asshole, but he finds himself grinding his teeth so hard he’s giving himself a headache.

The one and only time Ryan had tried something like that had been with his travel team in high school. He’d said it easy and casual, just like Ladd did. Not like it really mattered to him or anything.

“We hurting your feelings, homo?” had been the response. He never got shit for it later, but he never tried something like it again.

But fucking Andrew Ladd says it, and suddenly everyone’s on board. It makes Ryan want to hit something.

After practice he spots Eric holding a mini captains’ meeting with Tim and Alex. He doesn’t mean to eavesdrop, but it’s not like he can help it when they’re less than twenty feet away from his locker.

“Ladd’s right, that’s a good habit to break,” Eric says. “And I’m pretty sure my cousin Matt would appreciate it.”

Tim nods. “For sure. Those Canadians, huh?”

“All progressive and shit. No gay jokes, free healthcare —”

“But the milk comes in bags,” Eric cuts in. And they all laugh, like they didn’t just have a big gay summit or whatever.

His life in the locker room will suck less than it used to, and he has Andrew Ladd to thank for that. What the fuck.

–

And that should be the end of it, but a few days before Thanksgiving break, after a long practice, Jonesy stops Ladd as he’s hustling ass out of the locker room.

“Where you going, kid? You’re always running out of here like we all smell or something on Tuesday and Thursday.”

“You do smell,” Ladd says.

“Ha fucking ha,” Jonesy says. “Come on, you got a hot date or something?”

Ryan finds himself pausing as he’s unlacing his skates, waiting for the answer, even though he doesn’t care. He’d barely noticed that Ladd did disappear, except to sometimes be grateful he wasn’t around.

“I’ve got a GSA meeting to get to.” Ladd shrugs.

“GSA?” Jimmy asks.

“Gay straight alliance?” Ladd says, like Jimmy is stupid for not knowing what that means.

Ryan is kind of surprised that Jimmy doesn’t know what that means, but it pales compared to the revelation that Ladd is apparently going to GSA meetings twice a week

“But you’re not gay,” Jonesy says, puzzled.

Ladd laughs, like the idea is just ridiculous, and Ryan fists his hand. “No, man, but there are a couple of other words in the name there. Seabs says it’s important to promote awareness among jocks, and break down stereotypes and stuff.”

Ryan has only known Ladd a few months, but he’s already sick of hearing Seabs’s name constantly. But it would make sense that Ladd couldn’t come up with this stuff on his own.

“And,” Ladd adds, “there are some really hot bi chicks.”

That gets high fives from about half the room.

Ryan keeps his hand down.

–

It bothers the hell out of Ryan all week.

Ladd is talking about going to GSA meetings, and — and everybody just laughs it off. If Ryan did that, he’d be found out in about five minutes. It’s just so unfair it makes Ryan sick. Ladd doesn’t need to worry about how it looks to everyone else. He doesn’t have to worry about how he’s gonna prove he’s straight if it comes down to it. Not with people high fiving him for picking up bi girls he hasn’t even picked up yet. Or maybe he has and can keep his mouth shut about it, Ryan doesn’t know.

Ryan’s slept with two girls in his entire life, when the pressure got to be too much, and guys really were getting suspicious. They hadn’t been the worst experiences of his life, but it hadn’t been awesome either. And both girls ended up never talking to him after, because he ended up being an asshole about it. He hadn’t meant to be, but he hadn’t known how to handle it. He’d promised himself he’d never do it again.

It’s so unfair that Ladd gets to go to those meetings, that Ryan should be able to go to, without a care in the world.

When he goes home for Thanksgiving break, his mom figures out that something is up with him right away.

“Is everything going all right at school, honey?”

“Yeah, Mom.”

“Your classes aren’t too hard, are they?”

“No, they’re all, like, introductory classes, and the professors are pretty cool about giving us time to do the assignments when we have games and stuff.”

“And hockey’s going okay? You like your teammates?”

It’s nothing that he hasn’t told her over the phone a million times.

“Yeah, Mom, everyone’s great,” Ryan assures her.

“Oh good.” She smiles at him, and Ryan can’t feel bad for lying to her.

She’d been so glad when he told her there were a couple other freshman on the team, and Ryan had been too, at first. It diffuses some of the teasing and mild hazing, but at this point, Ryan would trade not having to deal with Ladd for more of that shit.

“What time are Todd and Jenny coming by?” Ryan asks. The house always seems weird and quiet without his siblings.

“Not for another hour or so,” his mom says, glancing at the clock.

“Cool, I’ll be in the garage,” Ryan says, grabbing a carrot stick from the platter.

The garage set up isn’t quite as fancy as The Gut, but it’s familiar and soothing, and it does have a few advantages. He can pick the music, for one, and there’s no one else around to bother him as he fires pucks at the net.

Ryan’s never been to a GSA meeting in his life. Not that he would have had time in high school anyway. He doesn’t even know what they really do, so it’s dumb to be getting all jealous.

He just can’t help thinking that it would be nice to go somewhere and not have to worry about hiding, or pretending to be okay with dumb jokes, or attracted to girls.

Whatever, he’s made it this far without that. He doesn’t need it. He has hockey. He takes one hard, vicious shot that clangs off the left post and ricochets into the shelves. It makes an awful racket.

“Ryan, honey,” his mom calls, “why don’t you come inside? They’ll be here soon.”

–

The weekend passes quickly, and suddenly Ryan’s on a plane back to school, rushing to get an assignment done before classes resume Monday morning.

There’s a fair amount of assists happening in the living room that night, since Ryan’s not the only one who forgot about school for four days.

Coach skates them hard at practice on Tuesday, to “burn off all that gravy.” They’ve got some important games coming up in the next few weeks, and Ryan’s just dying to get going.

He can’t help but notice when Ladd starts rushing through his change, and Ryan briefly considers following him, but Ladd’s gone before Ryan even has his jeans on.

The next day at practice, Ryan finds himself standing next to Ladd, waiting to run a drill.

“How was the meeting?” Ryan asks before he can stop himself.

Ladd looks at him like he’s nuts, which he very well might be. He and Ladd have made no secret of the fact that they dislike each other. The guys think it’s hilarious. Ryan just looks at him,
expressionless, waiting for an answer.

“Fine,” he says, and he skates off to run the drill.

Ryan tries again after practice, asking as casually as possible, “So, like, what do you do at the meetings?”

Ladd glares at him a moment and then leans in. “If someone’s putting you up to this shit, cut it out right now, or, I swear to god, Kesler, I’ll make you regret it.”

“What?” Ryan asks, baffled.

“These are my friends, and if you’re planning on fucking with them…”

“What — Are you fucking — Fuck you, no,” Ryan says, shoving him back a few steps. “Are you really so conceited that you think you’re the only one on the entire team that doesn’t hate the gays?”

Ladd crosses his arms and continues to glare. “If you’re so damn curious, why don’t you come to the meeting tomorrow?” He looks smug, like this will prove that Ryan is actually out to gay bash someone or something. Ryan really hates it when Ladd looks smug.

“Fine.” He shrugs, and tries not to look like just saying it terrifies him. “What room?”

“Student Union basement, room 8.” Ladd has stopped glaring, and now he just looks suspicious and surprised that Ryan called his bluff.

“See you there, then,” Ryan says, and the look on Ladd’s face is totally worth the sleep he won’t be getting tonight.

–

Ryan is on auto pilot most of Thursday, constantly debating whether or not he should actually go. What if someone there just looks at him and knows and then says something to Ladd?

But you can’t tell just by looking, he knows that, even though that possibility haunted him in high school. And even if someone did know, Ryan thinks it might actually be nice to have another guy to talk it over with. Just someone that knew and didn’t care.

Ladd ditches him after practice, because he’s an asshole, and maybe he expected Kesler to wimp out. He almost does, when he’s standing right outside the door, but the image of Ladd’s smug face propels him through.

He’s pretty sure he’s not late, but the small room is pretty full, and it feels like everyone is staring at him.

A guy leans down and whispers something to Ladd, who replies at a regular volume. “He’s on the team, but I didn’t bring him. If he’s an asshole, it’s not my fault.”

That earns him a smack on the arm from a girl with brown pigtails, and Ryan realizes he’s just been standing there in the door.

“Uh, hi,” he says to no one and everyone before dropping in the nearest empty seat.

All the chairs are arranged in a big circle, and Ryan feels like everyone is staring at him. Looking around, that’s because everyone is. Everyone except for Ladd, who seems pretty occupied with a guy and girl sitting on his lap, Jesus.

“What’s your name, soldier?” the guy next to him asks. Ryan swears conversation dies down in the room.

“Ryan,” he says. The guy smiles.

“I’m Jack. You are scrumptious!” he exclaims.

“Stop scaring the newbies, Jack,” the girl sitting next to Ladd scolds. “We want to keep them around.”

“It’s fine,” Ryan says, but he knows his smile is weak.

“See, Jane? He’s fine! And I do mean fine.” He winks at Ryan, and a few other people laugh. It actually is fine. Ryan can tell they’re not laughing at him. And Jack is over the top, but he’s kind of funny, and even though he’s leaning into Ryan he’s been careful not to touch.

“Okay, enough screwing around!” a girl yells. “Let’s get this meeting started. First order of business: the last queer coffeehouse of the semester is coming up Saturday night, and Mike’s gonna tell you what kind of help he needs.”

A guy stands up and says, “First, we need another flier party. Volunteers?”

A bunch of people raise their hands, including Ladd. Ryan wonders how many people are volunteering because Mike is cute. If you’re into that kinda look.

“Awesome,” Mike says. “And I’m gonna need some people to help me carry equipment the night of.”

Fewer people raise their hands, so Ryan finds himself lifting his arm in the air.

“You’ll help carry?” Mike asks him.

“I’m a jock,” Ryan says. “It’s pretty much all I’m good for.”

People laugh, and Jack says, “Not all…”

Across the circle, Ladd is looking at him. Ryan pretends not to notice.

–

The only thing that changes after the meeting is the number of friend requests he gets on Facebook between Thursday and Saturday. He’s not sure what he expected — something from the team, some reaction from Ladd. Just some acknowledgement of how huge that was. But there’s nothing, other than status messages from names he doesn’t really recognize.

He gets to the coffee house early, because in his experience from being the hosting team at a tournament, that’s usually a good thing when you’re setting things up. But he doesn’t take into account the awkward standing-around phase, while waiting for Mike to show up. He recognizes some people, but he doesn’t know names or what to say.

This shit’s easier with skates on.

Ryan’s not really expecting the girl who was sitting with Ladd on Thursday to approach him. He’s kind of surprised she’s here at all, because she’s kind of small for set-up, but maybe she’s tech support. Or maybe she’s Mighty Mouse.

“Hey,” she says, dropping her bag at his feet.

“Uh, hey,” Ryan says. He’s racking his brain trying to remember her name. He knows he heard it, but figured he’d never be talking to her, since she’s friends with Ladd.

“Jane,” she says, sticking out her hand, saving the day.

“I’m —”

“Ryan Kesler, I know.” He must look surprised because she says, “It’s not every day we get jocks at GSA. Especially jocks Andrew seems to have so many opinions about.”

“Bad opinions, I’m sure.”

“You are not wrong about that. Soooo, what’s your deal?”

“What, hasn’t Ladd told you all about me?”

“Well, he certainly said a lot of words, but I like to find things out for myself.”

Ryan looks around for Mike, but he’s on his own. “What, there can only be one unbigoted hockey player per school?”

“Touché,” Jane says. “We grilled Andrew to find out his deal too, when he first showed up, so don’t feel bad.”

“What is Ladd’s deal?”

Jane raises her eyebrows, but answers. “Straight but not narrow. He had no problem being Ben’s pretend boyfriend when his asshole ex came to town, you know?”

“Weird,” Ryan says.

“What, that he’d pretend to be a guy’s boyfriend?” Jane asks. She’s standing up taller, like she’s gearing up for a fight.

“That someone would want him to be their boyfriend. He’s an asshole.”

Jane laughs, “He says the same thing about you.”

“See, he’s an asshole.” Ryan shrugs.

“So what is your deal?” Jane asks again. “I told you what Andrew’s is.”

Ryan tries not to tense. “I’m not — I’m not here to destroy your clubhouse, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Jane gives him a long look, but before she can say anything, Mike comes in and calls everyone together.

Ryan ends up lugging a lot of speakers and amps and boxes of things. He never knew so much had to go into what is basically an open mic night.

He plans to stand in the back so he can sneak out before the truly awful performances, but Jane corners him again and says, “Let me buy you a coffee.”

“The coffee is free,” Ryan points out. Jane rolls her eyes. “Well, then have a free coffee with me, and it will count as a voucher for me buying you a good coffee some other time.”

Ryan should just walk away. She’s Ladd’s friend and doesn’t even seem to really trust him yet.

“Come on,” she says before he can decline. “It’s going to be horrible, and I need someone to make fun of everyone with me or I’ll go insane.”

“You’re persistent,” Ryan says, and he’s already walking over to the refreshment table.

“Yup,” Jane says, proudly.

–

After that, Jane decides to adopt him. That’s exactly how she puts it, because, she says, he clearly needs help.

“Hey!” Ryan says, but she doesn’t listen; she mostly just starts bossing him around.

For one, there are suddenly standing lunch plans, and half the time she’s got friends from her Women’s Studies classes with her. The first time he sits down at the table with them, he gets a look like they think he’s going to attack at any moment.

It’s mutual.

“Everyone, this is Ryan,” Jane says. “He’s cool.”

He doesn’t feel very cool, as he sits mostly in silence while they talk about things he’s never even heard of before.

He only makes the mistake of referring to the women’s team as the girl’s team once. “It’s still weird being called the men’s team,” he says. “I wasn’t trying to demean them or anything.”

Jane beams at him across the table, and he relaxes a little. He likes having a friend who doesn’t care about hockey. It’d suck to fuck that up entirely.

Ryan relaxes more at the GSA meetings, since they get more informal as the semester winds down, but Ladd keeps giving him skeptical looks from across the circle. Whatever, Ryan doesn’t care, and actually he kind of enjoys bothering Ladd by doing absolutely nothing. He should’ve started coming to these earlier.

Another thing that happens is that in the midst of finals and games, when Ryan is so stressed out he’s regretting his decision not to play in juniors, Ryan gets a friend suggestion from Jane on Facebook.

Jane suggests you be friends with Andrew Ladd.

“What the fuck?” he asks when she picks up the phone. “Is this some kind of joke to help me lighten up during finals?”

“I don’t like rifts in the family,” Jane says, not even bothering to pretend she doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

“Even if we were friends on Facebook, it doesn’t mean we’d be friends in real life,” Ryan informs her.

“You know, you guys might like each other if you ever stopped calling each other assholes long enough to talk.”

“No, we wouldn’t. Jane, we spend enough time together as it is. Don’t you think we’d know by now?”

“Whatever, just do it, so I don’t feel like I’m betraying one of you every time I talk to the other. I already talked to Andrew about this, by the way.”

“Ugh, fine, whatever, don’t you have finals to worry about instead of who I’m friends with on Facebook?”

“Yes, I do. Stop bothering me.” She hangs up without letting Ryan say goodbye.

Ryan actually still has a friend request from Ladd from the beginning of the season, when everybody was just friending everyone on the team. Ryan hadn’t answered right away, already sure that he wasn’t going to like the guy. Eventually he just started ignoring it. He goes in and confirms the “friendship,” then sends Jane a text in all caps: “THERE. ARE YOU HAPPY NOW?”

He’s already on Ladd’s profile, so he pokes around a bit. Every other comment on his wall appears to be from Brent Seabrook - Michigan, and every comment seems to involve Seabs calling Ladd “babe” or “sugarlips” and once “muffin,” which prompted Ladd to say, “DUNCS MAKE HIM STOP.”

Duncan Keith - Michigan State replied with, “what do you expect me to do?”

Ryan scrolls away from that conversation. He doesn’t care about how Ladd is still best friends with all the guys he played with before now. It’s not like Ryan isn’t still friends with a lot of the guys from the NDP, but they’re not weird like Ladd’s Canadians.

He scoffs a little when he sees that there are 652 pictures of Andrew Ladd. Ladd’s probably drunk in all of them. He clicks through and discovers he’s half right. Half of them are him on the ice, playing, but plenty of the rest are of the “don’t ask what’s in that cup” variety.

He’s not perving on Ladd’s friends when he clicks on an album called “LAKE HOUSE!!!” Except maybe he is. There are a lot of guys in swim trunks doing stupid shit, and Ladd’s not in every picture, so Ryan can actually enjoy looking at them.

Brent Seabrook - Michigan is tagged in more of them than Ladd is, and that’s okay because he’s actually … not bad to look at. He has a big goofy smile and a really nice chest, despite it being so pasty he’s clearly a hockey player. The next picture is of Brent Seabrook in the middle of Ladd and another guy — the Duncan Keith - Michigan State, apparently. They’re all shirtless and leaning into each other with their arms around each other and smiling and …

Ryan closes the tab as fast as his hand can move. He is not drooling over Ladd’s friends. He’s just not.

He has studying to do. He doesn’t have time for this.

–

The semester ends, and Ryan flies home in a daze, just hoping he passed everything so he can keep playing hockey. He sleeps for pretty much 2 days straight, hangs out with his mom and his siblings and the few friends that are around. Only a week later, he has to head back to Vermont for practice.

The campus feels empty and weird without the rest of the students. Ryan finds himself missing Jane and even her Women’s Studies friends. It’s not that he doesn’t like most of the guys on the team, it’s just that they can be too much sometimes, and there’s not much to do when they’re not in practice with no class and no other students.

Jane’s home in Massachusetts, and Ryan ends up texting her a lot. He should have known that eventually the other guys would get nosy about it.

“Who you texting, Kes?” Tim asks. He says it casually, but Kesler’s aware of the fact that half the team’s attention is on him.

“My friend Jane,” he says casually. “She’s in Massachusetts for the break.”

“Is she hot?” Jared asks. Eric kicks him, but Ryan just shrugs.

“Yeah.” She is, if you’re into the sometimes angry nerd girl look. He’s not, but he’s not telling them that.

Ladd frowns behind Eric, but doesn’t say anything as Eric asks, “Is she coming to the tourney?”

“Uh, I don’t know,” Ryan says. “Probably not, since the dorms are closed.”

“Could let her sleep here,” Alex suggests with a smirk.

“Not in the middle of a tournament,” Eric says, shutting that line of conversation down.

Thank god.

“So I hear you think I’m hot,” Jane says when she calls him a few days later.

“What?” Ryan leaves the living room and closes himself in his room. He has a feeling he doesn’t want to be around the other guys for this conversation.

“You think I’m hot?”

“Um, I didn’t mean anything by it,” Ryan says. “The guys were like —”

“Aw, Ryan, you’re breaking my heart.” She laughs.

Ryan sighs. “I mean, obviously, you’re very pretty, and if I was —” He stops when he realizes what he was about to say.

“If you were into girls?” Jane finishes for him.

Ryan needs to sit down. “Yeah,” he says weakly. “That.”

“Breathe,” Jane says. “It’s okay.”

Ryan puts his head between his knees and wonders where the smelling salts are when you need them.

“You never told anyone before, huh?”

Ryan shakes his head, then realizes she can’t see that and answers her out loud.

“Are you freaking out?” Jane asks gently.

“A little,” Ryan answers, his voice small, because he feels like he can’t breathe. It’s weird, he feels like a weight has moved off his shoulders and onto his chest.

“I won’t tell you not to be freaked, but I promise I won’t tell anyone, not even the cute guys who have asked me about you or —”

“Don’t tell Ladd,” Ryan says suddenly. “Not that he’s one of those guys.” He wants to ask who they are, but there’s no point. He’s not out. He’s not going to date anyone. “Just. Just don’t.”

“I won’t, I won’t tell anyone,” Jane assures him. “But I’m glad you told me.”

He hadn’t planned on telling her, but now that he has, he is kind of glad she knows. “Me too.”

–

The rest of the students finally start showing up the weekend before Martin Luther King Day. Classes will start on Tuesday, and Ryan can’t believe he’s actually looking forward to it, a little, just for something to do.

That doesn’t mean he’s not going to enjoy the hell out his last Sunday with no schoolwork and no practice, though. By early afternoon, he hasn’t showered or put on clothes other than shorts and a hoodie, and he’s packed into the den with most of the rest of the team to watch football on the huge HD TV. Smitty, Jared, and Mark are all raging Pats fans — they’re entertaining as hell to watch.

By halftime, they’re arguing over what takeout they should order and how many buffalo wings each of them can eat. The doorbell rings in the middle of one of Jonesy’s rants about Ryan doesn’t even know what.

“I’ll get it,” Tim says.

He comes back in a few minutes later with a tall guy with a goofy smile and a duffel bag that looks vaguely familiar.

“Seabs?” Ladd says, looking up from the other couch.

“I missed you, babe!” Seabs declares, and he doesn’t get farther than that because Ladd launches himself off the couch and jumps on him.

“You fucking bastard, what are you doing here?” Ladd asks, but he’s grinning like a madman and holding onto Seabs with his arms and legs.

“Christmas present,” Seabs says into Ladd’s shoulder. They’re still not letting go of each other. They’re practically humping in the doorway. Ryan can’t make himself look away.

They don’t stop, like, ever. They cram onto the couch, sitting half on top of each other and talking to each other like they’re the only ones in the room. It’s kind of rude, and Ryan’s not like, trying to eavesdrop or anything, but it’s basically impossible not to. It’s not like he can tell half of what they’re saying as they throw out names and places that he has no hope of following.

“Duncs?”

“Visiting Sharpy in Lethbridge,” Seabs says.

“What, did your moms get you guys matching Christmas gifts?”

“Pretty much.” Seabs grins. “You complaining?”

“No!”

“Oh my god, would you two shut up?” Smitty snaps. “You’re like twelve-year-old girls. The Patriots are on.”

“Testy ‘cause your boys are losing?” Ladd shoots back.

“Fuck off.”

Ryan smirks. He’s a Lions fan and is tired of taking shit about it, so he’s fine watching Smitty’s boys go down in flames.

Finally they take it back to Ladd’s room, which is great, because no one actually wants to see that. But Seabs is apparently visiting until Wednesday night, so they’re around all the time, groping each other.

Ryan swears they’re not normal. No guys he ever knew were this handsy with each other. Not even the fact that they’re Canadian can explain it, Ryan is pretty sure.

Seabs comes to practice with them and sits on the bench and chirps them, Ladd especially. Coach lets it go, because apparently he knows who Seabs is from scouting Michigan, and thinks it’s a good opportunity for the team to hear what’s wrong with them from someone else.

Classes start on Tuesday, and Ryan is glad to have an excuse to not hang around Ladd and Seabs for a while.

Except that apparently Ladd is in his Geology class, just his fucking luck.

He sits a few rows behind them and really hopes they don’t turn around. It’s kind of hard to pay attention to the professor when Ladd and Seabs are horsing around and whispering and generally being a distraction. Not like the professor is saying anything interesting, just passing out the syllabus and telling them they need to come to lecture, even though it’s a big class.

The professor lets them out early, and Ryan hurries out, hoping he can pretend he didn’t see them at all.

–

After practice that afternoon, Seabs is sitting in with them, joking around with a few of the guys. It’s not like Ryan cares or anything, but Jesus, Seabs isn’t on their team.

“What’s going on tonight?” he hears Seabs asks Ladd.

“There’s a GSA meeting,” Ladd says, “but we can skip it if you wanna do something else.”

“What? No way! Let’s go to that!” Seabs sounds unreasonably excited, and seriously, what do they put in the water in Vancouver?

Ladd is usually out of the locker room before Ryan, but Seabs is slowing him down, so they kind of end up walking towards the student union together, but with a dozen steps between them. Seabs glances back towards Ryan a couple times, giving him a look and then elbowing Ladd.

Ladd just shrugs, but Seabs slows down until he catches up with them. “Laddy says you’re going to GSA, too.”

“Uh, yeah,” Ryan says.

“That’s awesome,” Seabs says, grinning and slapping Ryan on the back.

“I guess,” Ryan says. He doesn’t really know what else to say, so he stays quiet while Ladd keeps talking to Seabs like he isn’t even there.

As the three of them file into the meeting room, a few of the people already there just openly stare.

“Oh my god, they’re multiplying,” one of the girls says.

“Andrew, you are a joy,” a guy sighs. Ben, Ryan thinks.

“Hey, guys, this is Seabs,” Ladd says.

“Oh really?” Mike says, giving them both an appraising look.

“Have you been telling them about me, honey?” Seabs asks.

“Nothing good,” Ladd says, grinning at him.

Ryan rolls his eyes and pushes past them. Jane’s helping set up the chairs in the usual circle, but.

“Someone fucked up,” she says. “Half of the chairs are missing.”

“I can sit on the floor,” Ryan tells her.

“I’ll just use Laddy as a chair,” Seabs declares and sits right down on Ladd’s lap.

“Like hell you will, fatty,” Ladd yells and pushes Seabs off.

“I am wounded, Andy. Wounded!”

“Oh my god, don’t call me that.” Ladd stands up and gestures to his chair. “You sit.” Seabs does, and Ladd settles himself in his lap.

“Oof,” Seabs says pointedly, but Ladd ignores him and rests his arms around Seabs’ shoulders. The rest of the GSA is openly staring at them now.

“So freakin’ cute,” Ryan hears Lucy say.

Ladd and Seabs are not freakin’ cute. They are assholes. Just coming in here and being all over each other, while even the other guys here, the guys who are actually gay, don’t do that. And the reason they don’t, Ryan thinks, as he takes a seat at Jane’s feet, is because they’ve had to be careful their entire lives. And it’s pretty clear that Ladd and Seabs never had to learn to be careful of anything in their lives.

They think they’re so cool for coming into the GSA and acting all open-minded when they have no fucking clue what it’s like and —

“Down boy,” Jane whispers, setting her hand on his shoulder.

Ryan sighs, leans back against her chair, and just tries to ignore them. He’s the only one, though. No one’s paying attention to Erin, who’s trying her damndest to run the meeting, but it’s spiraling out of control.

“No one’s busy tonight,” Ben hisses. “Why not?”

“Some of us have class in the morning,” Lucy hisses back.

“It’s the second day, no one will care if you’re hung over,” one of the juniors says. “Trust me.”

“You’re coming, right?” Jane leans over to ask him.

“What?”

“To the party? That everyone’s been talking about for the past 5 minutes?”

“Yeah, sure — wait,” Ryan looks at her suspiciously. “No.”

“Oh, come on, Ryan! It’s a party, you can avoid them.”

Ryan sighs. “Fine. There better be beer.”

Jane beams, and Ryan wonders why he lets her talk him into these things.

Erin dismisses them shortly after that, since no one is even pretending to pay attention anymore. “Come back on Thursday ready to be serious!” she says.

“Since when are we ever serious?” Jack asks.

–

The party is at some guy’s house just off campus that looks a lot like the hockey house, but probably neater, and it definitely smells better. It’s crowded when Ryan gets there, but not hockey party crowded, which is actually pretty nice. Ryan grabs a beer out of the fridge and wanders into the living room.

Jane is having a spirited conversation with Erin and Lucy at the end of the hall, so Ryan just points to where he’ll be and hopes she sees it. He takes a seat on the couch and pretends to be really interested in the movie that’s on the TV. He’s guessing that no one’s going to let him change it to hockey.

There are a few other people on the couch, and Ryan sort of pretends he’s in the conversation with them, just so he doesn’t look so pathetic. Ladd and Seabs are, like, holding court near the kitchen, telling stories that make the whole group laugh and fawn over them both. It’s disgusting.

They’re also blocking the access to more beer, which is just rude.

When Ladd disappears off somewhere, Ryan takes the opportunity to cut through the group with one muttered “Excuse me,” and grab a couple of beers from the fridge. They’re not as cold as the last one, probably replacements, but he’s not going to complain.

“Hey, grab me one?” Seabs asks from behind him.

Ryan passes him one without saying anything.

“Thanks, Kes,” Seabs says. They haven’t actually been introduced, but he’s been staying in their house for the past three days, so it’s not really a surprise that Seabs knows his name.

“No problem,” Ryan says, slamming the fridge shut.

“So what’s your deal?” Seabs asks.

“Excuse me?” Ryan asks. He doesn’t get why Seabs cares — he’s probably just spying for Ladd.

“Are you queer, or doing the PFLAG route like Laddy?”

“That’s a whole shitload of none of your business,” Ryan snaps. It’s one thing for Jane to ask when he’s coming into her space, but Seabs is another story. Ryan doesn’t owe Seabs anything.

“You’re not missing much,” Seabs says, shrugging. “Laddy’s handjob technique is for shit.”

“What? No. I don’t care — why —” Ryan sputters. “I’m not…”

Seabs’s phone starts ringing, and he holds a finger up in front of Ryan’s face. “Hold on. It’s the Mrs.”

Ryan tunes out after Seabs answers with “Hey baby,” because the last thing he needs is to hear yet another dude getting sloppy over his girlfriend. But he can’t leave — Seabs is blocking him in against the fridge. Ladd spots them then, and Ryan has never been so happy to see him in his life, because at least he’ll take Seabs away.

But Seabs slaps at Ladd’s hand when he tries to pull him away and points to the phone. Now Ladd is standing there, blocking Ryan in even more. Fuck. At least he can get to the beer. He grabs another one because he thinks he’s gonna need it.

“Tell Duncs hi for me,” Ladd says, “but that it’s my weekend. Your ass is his like, every other day you losers have off.”

Seabs doesn’t say anything to Ladd, but he wiggles his ass in his direction. Ryan has to rewind the conversation in his head to make sure he heard those pronouns right. Seabs laughs at something the guy on the other end says before saying, “Love you,” and hanging up.

“He’s agreed on possession of land below the waist, but says you can apply for a visitor’s pass above. If he gets pictures.”

“Been there, done that, got the t-shirt,” Ladd says. Then he remembers that Ryan is there and glares at him like Ryan’s done something wrong, other than getting stuck here with these assholes. “Come on,” Ladd says to Seabs, “I want you to meet some cool people.”

“But —” Seabs says, but Ladd drags him away. To find cool people. In other words, people who aren’t Ryan. Well, good. If Ladd is avoiding him for the rest of the night, it will be easier for Ryan to have a good time. Also, he needs a good fifteen minutes to recover from whatever the hell just happened.

He spends the rest of the party with Jane, hanging out and trying not to be weird or antisocial while also avoiding Ladd and Seabs at all costs.

It works out well enough, and he’s having a good time, until Ladd comes up to him, looking resigned. “I need your help.”

Ryan is immediately suspicious. “With what?”

“Seabs tried to match Ben shot for shot,” Ladd says, rolling his eyes. “He’s still conscious, but I’m gonna need help getting him back to the house.”

Ryan looks over to the table where Seabs is leaning hard on Ben, who’s at least five inches shorter and thirty pounds lighter but is still laughing and smiling brightly. “Yeah, okay.”

He says goodbye to Jane and discovers she’s a very huggy drunk. “Someone gonna walk you home?” he asks.

“We’ll go in a group in a little bit, don’t worry,” she says, hugging him again.

Ladd has Seabs standing by the time Ryan gets over to them, and Seabs appears to be putting his whole weight on him.

Ryan grabs one of Seabs’s arms and slings it around his shoulders.

“Come on, Seabsie, we’re gonna go home,” Ladd says.

“‘Kay,” Seabs says. They start walking. Seabs is clearly trying, but it’s mostly Ladd and Ryan dragging him as he mumbles things.

“Duncs gonna be there?” he asks.

“Duncs is in Lethbridge, buddy.”

“I miss Duncs,” Seabs says sadly.

“I know,” Ladd says, rolling his eyes.

It’s kind of a long walk, and it’s cold, and Seabs is heavy, but he’s friendly. He keeps petting Ryan’s shoulder.

“You’re okay, Ryan,” Seabs says.

“Thanks,” Ryan says.

“I like you,” Seabs continues. “You have my blessing.”

Ryan doesn’t even know what that means, but he says, “That means a lot, Seabs, thanks,” in his humor-the-drunk-person voice. Ladd is frowning, but whatever.

They finally get to the house, and Ryan is so grateful Ladd’s room is on the first floor. They dump Seabs into Ladd’s bed, and he immediately starts snoring.

“That’s gonna be fun tonight,” Ladd says. “Thanks for helping me get him home.” He sounds constipated when he says thank you to Ryan, and Ryan can’t help be a little satisfied at that. Now Ryan can go to bed and not deal with them for a good 8 hours.

But somehow, instead of leaving, he’s opening his mouth and asking Ladd, “Is he the reason you joined the GSA?”

Ladd shrugs. “Yeah.”

“Is he … I mean, people know about him and, uh, Duncs? And it’s cool?”

“His friends know,” Ladd says, “but he just figures that people at a GSA party are gonna be cool.” He glares at Ryan like Ryan’s gonna call up the Canadian Junior team and tell them Brent Seabrook is a flaming queer.

“I’m not gonna tell anyone, Jesus!” Ryan says.

“You better —”

“Get over yourself, Ladd. I have better things to do than care about your friends’ lives.” He turns and walks out and upstairs. He barely gets his sneakers and jeans off before he’s falling into his bed, exhausted.

–

When Ryan gets back from classes the next day, Seabs is gone, and Ladd is moping on the couch in the living room. If Ryan didn’t know that Seabs was dating another guy — in love with another guy, his brain supplies with the memory from last night — he’d swear there was something going on between them.

But Ladd’s straight, so it would be wrong anyway.

Ryan jogs up the stairs so he can get away from Andrew Ladd and his manpain. But when he gets to his laptop, there’s an email from Facebook: “Brent Seabrook wants to be your friend!”

There’s a message with the friend request, too.

If you ever need to talk, you can totally hit up me or Duncs.

Ryan slams the lid of his laptop shut.

He didn’t get enough sleep last night, so he gets in bed, pulls his covers over his head, and tries to take a nap. But it’s hard to sleep when he can’t breathe normally.

That just can’t mean what he thinks it means. There’s no way that Seabs should be able to tell. Ryan didn’t do anything — unless maybe he did. And if someone like Seabs can figure him out, then maybe other people can too, maybe they already have, and maybe —

Ryan makes himself hold his breath for 30 seconds and then let it all out slowly. He has got to calm down. Nobody knows, except Jane, and maybe Seabs. And Seabs isn’t gonna tell anyone; if anything, Seabs is just going to understand. And maybe Seabs doesn’t even know, maybe he means something totally different. Okay, that’s not likely, but it’s not the end of the world if Seabs knows. They have a mutually assured destruction thing going on anyway, so it’s fine.

And he doesn’t even have to accept Seabs’s friend request. Just because Seabs is freakishly friendly doesn’t mean Ryan has to be friends with Ladd’s friends. But, well, Seabs is the only other hockey player Ryan’s ever met who’s like him and it just … it might be nice to know him. Just in case.

Ryan throws back the covers and opens his laptop again. He confirms the friend request, but sends a message back: “Thanks, dude, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Seabs’s profile picture is him and Duncs with their arms thrown over each other’s shoulders as they toast the camera, and his relationship status is Married to Duncan Keith.

It doesn’t mean anything, because half of Ryan’s team is “in a relationship” with the other half, except the few guys that actually have girlfriends. But it does mean something, and Ryan knows it means something, and that’s…he doesn’t know what exactly.

He needs his nap.

He manages to fall asleep this time, and he wakes up an hour later feeling more like a person.

He has two emails. One is a Facebook message from Brent Seabrook that says, “It’s called gaydar, dude. Don’t worry.”

The next is a friend request from Duncan Keith with a message that says, “Seabs says I have to be your friend. Um, hi, I guess.”

Ryan rolls his eyes at both messages, but hits confirm for Duncan anyway. He gets the feeling that giving Seabs what he wants is just easier. Hopefully Seabs will forget about him in three days and get another project.

His stomach growls loudly then, so he shuts his laptop and goes to dinner.

–

Ryan didn’t think it was possible, but Ladd actually gets more obnoxious after Seabs leaves.

Ryan is watching him, waiting for him to act differently in case Seabs lets something slip, but all that happens is that he mopes for two days and then goes into obnoxious overdrive.

At GSA meetings, it’s like he’s grown extra hands just to fucking grope people with. His lap has always been prime real estate, but now it’s like Ryan can never even see his face because there are several people sitting on his knees at a time. And Ladd will pet them and nuzzle them, and it’s actually fucking gross. Even Jack jokingly calls him “Handsy McGroperson” one night.

But when he’s with the team, it’s like he’s suddenly turned into the asshole Ryan thought he was going to be at the beginning of the year. It’s not that he never hit on girls before, but Ryan is pretty sure he was never this obnoxious about it. He hits on their waitresses at team dinner two weeks in a row. He makes out with a forward from the women’s hockey team and walks around looking smug the entire next day.

By the time Ben’s birthday party rolls around, Ryan is ready to kill him.

He can’t skip the party, because Ben’s been cool to him, and it’s his birthday — and he’s afraid of the guilt trip that will be laid if he misses it.

“Oh, you brought Ben a present!” Jane laughs when he finds her in the crowd.

“Uh,” Ryan says. His hands are empty except the can of beer he picked up.

“Tight shirt,” Jane says. “It should appease him well enough.”

Jane nods across the room to where Ben is wearing a crown of rainbow ribbons and demanding a kiss from Mike. “It’s my birthday!”

“He’s not, I mean, he won’t —” Ryan starts, his blood running cold.

“Oh no, not you,” Jane assures him. “You might get your ass grabbed, but he’ll stick to the willing for his other gifts.”

It sucks how much of a relief that is.

He does give Ben a hug as consolation, squeezing him tight and lifting him off his feet.
“Thanks, baby,” Ben says, and he doesn’t try anything else.

Ryan is actually having a good time. Jack shows up in drag and sings Ben “Happy Birthday” like he’s Marilyn Monroe or something while everyone cheers.

He doesn’t notice when Ladd gets there, but he does notice when Ben yells across the room, “Andy! Come here right now and give me my birthday present!”

Ladd makes his way to Ben. “Ready for the best birthday present ever?” he asks. Then he grabs Ben around the waist, dips him, and kisses him right on the mouth. The kiss goes on for a long time. Ryan is pretty sure he sees tongue. Everyone is cat-calling and clapping, but Ryan feels like he’s gonna be sick.

After about forever, they come up for air. Ben fans his face and, inexplicably, Ladd looks right at Ryan.

Ryan slams his beer down on the counter and walks out.

It’s fucking freezing because it’s January, but the goosebumps and the way the cold air feels hitting his lungs are a good distraction.

He hears footsteps behind him and sighs. “Jane, go back inside, it’s freezing out.”

“I’m Canadian,” Ladd says behind him. “I can deal.”

Ryan immediately tenses again. “You’re from Vancouver, not Edmonton; it’s not that impressive.” Livonia gets colder than Vancouver does.

“Quit being a douche,” Ladd says. “If you can’t handle two dudes making out, maybe you’re in the wrong club.”

“It’s not ‘two dudes’,” Ryan snaps. “It’s you, coming around here and kissing Ben and nuzzling Jack — and then going out to dinner with the team, and if someone asks about the GSA you go falling over yourself at the sight of a pair of tits.”

“It doesn’t fucking mean anything!”

“Yeah, I know. And I’m sick of you using my sexuality like it’s some sort of party trick! Some of us can’t just go and bang a chick if people start asking questions. Some of have to fucking live with this without being able to run away to heterosexuality if it gets too tough.” Ryan spits the words out and shoves Ladd out of the way on his way back inside.

He makes it back to the kitchen where Jane is, riding his wave of righteous anger.

“What happened?” Jane asks, and he realizes what he just said. To Andrew Ladd.

“Oh god.” He is so so screwed. He leans against the wall and tries to breathe.

“Ryan, you’re freakin’ me out. What’s going on?”

He briefly explains what just went down. “I’m fucked,” he concludes. “He’s gonna tell everyone.”

“No, he won’t,” Jane soothes. “He won’t. I’ll talk to him, okay?”

Ryan nods, even though he still feels doomed. “Thanks. I think I’m gonna head out.”

Jane nods and goes with him to get his coat.

–

Ryan sleeps badly that night, and he spends the next day waiting for the ax to fall. For the shouting and the questions and the shunning.

They probably won’t kick him off the team outright, too worried about a lawsuit. But they can make him want to quit on his own, and once the news leaks out to other teams, it’ll be even worse.

Even if he does make it through his college career alive and unmaimed, the Canucks will probably never sign him to an actual contract. If they do, he’ll spend his entire contract in Manitoba, being given constant reasons they’re not calling him up that will all add up to the same reason.

But nothing happens that day. Or the next.

Jane rolls his eyes when she sees him. “He’s not gonna say anything. I told you.”

But Ryan doesn’t even start to relax until most of the way through the week, when their upcoming trip to upstate New York takes precedence.

He takes the week’s anxiety and frustration out on the other team but only lands in the box for it once, so Coach just looks pleased between periods. Cam and Chris are feeding off his energy, too, and it ends up infecting the rest of the team.

By the end of the game, the Saints are making bad passes to avoid getting hit while holding it, and the Catamounts get a solid win.

After the game, Eric calls everyone to attention. “Despite the absolute beating we just gave them, our hosts are gracious enough to offer us an invitation to a party tonight.”

One of Eric’s cousins is on their team, so a party was kind of a given. Ryan hadn’t really been looking forward to it, but after today, he’s feeling pretty good, and a party with the guys doesn’t seem like such a bad idea.

The party is at Eric’s cousin’s house. Eric has like, 3 million cousins, and they all play hockey at every level all over North America. And one in Sweden.

Technically Eric and the Saint Lawrence captain are supposed to be chaperoning them, but all that means is that they gave the teams a lecture about not overdoing it.

Ryan grabs a beer and let’s some of the other team’s guys smack him on the shoulder and yell “don’t hit me!” One of them was also drafted by the Canucks, so they talk for a while about the team and how soon they might turn pro.

Ryan doesn’t want to get too drunk, but he’s feeling pleasantly buzzed, and he has to pee. Someone is puking in the downstairs bathroom, and he doesn’t want to freeze his dick off outside, so he heads upstairs, even though it’s supposed to be off limits.

He finishes up, splashes some cold water on his face, and walks out, straight into Ladd.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Ladd says. He’s not slurring his words, but his cheeks are flushed bright red, and he’s blinking more than he usually does.

“Neither are you,” Ryan says, and he tries to brush past him. Ladd stops him with a hand on his chest.

“Fuck you,” Ladd says. Oh, Christ, Ryan doesn’t want to do this.

“Let’s not right now, okay? Let’s just go downstairs.”

“No!” Ladd won’t let him by. Why do these things happen to him, Ryan wonders. “Fuck you. You’re so superior. You think you know everything.”

“Well, not everything,” Ryan drawls, then sighs. “I really don’t wanna do this right now.”

“Too fucking bad,” Ladd says. “You don’t know shit about me. You —”

“You know what? Save it,” Ryan snaps. “Save the offended act for after you blow a guy, you enormous douche.”

Ladd doesn’t say anything. He puts both hands on Ryan’s chest and pushes him back into the bathroom. Great, Ryan thinks, I’m gonna get beat up in a bathroom by a drunk dude. But Ladd doesn’t hit him. He maneuvers Ryan until he’s up against the sink, and then he drops to his knees.

Wait, what?

He’s not even hard as Ladd undoes his belt and fumbles with the button on his jeans and yanks the zipper down. He’s getting there, though, because he’s eighteen, and there’s a hot guy taking off his pants, and it’s been a long time since that’s happened to Ryan.

Ladd seems surprised or annoyed that Ryan’s dick isn’t ready right away, but that huff of air against his dick speeds things up considerably. Ryan wants to tell Ladd to just fucking touch him already, but he bites his lip instead. He doesn’t know if he’s supposed to be helping Ladd with this, or if saying something will scare Ladd off, or what.

Fortunately, Ladd figures it out quickly enough, maybe remembering what it’s like from the other side. Ryan doesn’t know or care, because Ladd’s jerking him and licking his lips, staring at Ryan’s cock like it’s a play he needs to dissect. Ryan’s probably not supposed to find that hot, but it really works for him.

And then Ladd opens his mouth and takes in the head of Ryan’s dick. It takes a whole lot of will power to keep from pushing forward, or grabbing Ladd’s head and making him take more.

He grips the edge of the sink when Ladd starts sucking, and he can’t help the little noise that escapes his mouth. That seems to encourage Ladd, and he slowly takes more of Ryan’s cock into his mouth.

It’s pretty easy to tell that he’s never done this before, and that shouldn’t be hot either, but it feels so fucking good. After a few minutes, Ladd finishes exploring and gets a rhythm going, and that feels even better. Ryan will be so fucking embarrassed if he comes right now, from this, but it’s been so long since he’s had anything other than his hand. He grits his teeth and holds on.

Ladd’s making these little sounds too, not even sexy sounds, just little “hmms” like he’s figuring things out, but they hum around Ryan’s cock, and he can’t help the little stutter his hips give. Ladd pulls back a little and looks up at Ryan, but before Ryan has a chance to say anything, he goes right back to sucking Ryan’s cock, a little harder and a little faster, and Ryan really really can’t take much more of this.

“Gonna come,” he manages to say, and Ladd gives his cock one last suck, then pulls off and finishes Ryan with his hand.

When Ryan comes back to reality, his pants are around his knees, and Ladd is still on the floor in front of him, looking at his hand covered in Ryan’s come like he’s wondering what to do with it. There’s a bulge in his jeans and Jesus, he’s hard from blowing Ryan.

Ryan tugs on Ladd’s arm till he’s standing. Ladd looks a little confused, and he sways until he’s sort of leaning against Ryan. He starts looking a lot less confused when Ryan undoes his jeans and sticks his hand inside.

“Oh,” he says, and reaches around Ryan to hold himself up on the sink, his head dropping down to Ryan’s shoulder. It’s a weird position, but Ryan can deal with it. Besides, it’s only a couple minutes until Ladd’s groaning into Ryan’s shoulder and coming on his hand.

“Fuck, Kesler,” Ladd says into Ryan’s shoulder.

Ryan just jerked off Andrew Ladd. Andrew Ladd just blew him.

Nothing makes any sense, but there’s come on his hand, so it’s probably not a hallucination. He reaches for a fistful of toilet paper, but he has to shove Ladd off of him to get at it. He wipes his hand quickly before flushing the evidence away and pulling his pants back up.

Ladd’s still blinking at him from the opposite wall, and Ryan — Ryan just can’t deal with this right now. There are two hockey teams downstairs, and he can’t —

He has to go.

Ryan doesn’t know what to say to Ladd, so he just doesn’t say anything before he slips out the door, quickly closing it behind him again before heading back down to the party.

–

If Ryan had expected anything major to change after Andrew Ladd blew him in a bathroom, he would have been disappointed.

They don’t talk on the bus back to Burlington, or at practice on Monday. The only real difference is that now Ryan knows what Ladd’s mouth feels like wrapped around his cock, and he can’t stop thinking about it.

Ladd acts like nothing happened, though. Ryan’s not exactly sure what he thought Ladd was going to do, or even what he wants Ladd to do, but acting exactly the same isn’t it.

After practice on Tuesday, Ladd is slower than usual getting dressed, and they end up leaving for GSA at the same time. They kind of walk together, because it would be weird not to, but they don’t say anything.

“You hungry?” Ladd asks suddenly, as they walk into the student union.

Ryan turns the words over in his mind, searching for some sort of innuendo — and if it is innuendo or some sort of invitation, what’s his answer? He realizes he’s been quiet for too long, and quickly says, “No.”

Ladd just nods, and they walk in silence down to the meeting room. Jane raises an eyebrow when they come in together, but he’s pretty sure it’s just the appearance of civility between them. He hasn’t even told her what happened yet.

Nothing’s actually changed, though, because almost as soon as Ladd sits down, he’s got a person perched on each knee, and that can’t even be comfortable, so Ryan doesn’t get what the big deal is.

Ladd waits for Ryan after practice on Thursday too, which is weird, but whatever. Probably Jane talked to him, or maybe someone on the team. He doesn’t say anything as they walk, so that’s fine. Ryan had been planning on grabbing a sandwich when he got to the Student Union, but now he feels weird just walking away from Ladd, because they’ve kinda been walking together.

“I’m gonna go get a sandwich,” he says, making a vague gesture toward the dining area.

“Cool, me too,” Ladd says, and okay, fine. They both get sandwiches wrapped up to go, and at the register, Ladd grabs Ryan’s, and says, “I’ll get it, I’ve got an unlimited meal plan.”

Before Ryan can respond that he has an unlimited meal plan too — he’s a hockey player, for god’s sake, his mom’s not dumb — Ladd has given the lady his card and handed Ryan back his sandwich. Ryan stares down at it, wondering what the hell is going on, until Ladd waves a hand in front of his face and says, “Meeting’s gonna start. You coming?”

“Yeah,” Ryan says. He is not going to think about Ladd saying the word “coming” in another context.

Ryan really doesn’t want to think about what it means that Ladd bought him a sandwich. It probably doesn’t mean anything. And that’s just so like Andrew Ladd, to blow Ryan in a bathroom, and then go around trying to prove he can forget about it. Like he’s so straight that giving another dude a blowjob is not a big deal. God, Ryan just wants to kick him.

The most infuriating part of the latest brand of dickishness from Ladd is that nothing he’s said or done looks particularly dickish unless you have the context for it.

Context Ryan doesn’t plan on sharing with anyone, if he can manage it.

So he has to suffer and fume in silence, because Jane gets tired of his “monotonous whining.”

–

He gets a Facebook message from Seabs about a week after the bathroom incident.

Hey Kes, what’s up? Heard you played a brutal game Saturday.

He’s got to be implying something with the specific mention of Saturday, and Ryan glares at the screen. Of course Ladd told him. He probably bragged to Seabs about it.

At least — at least Seabs already knew about him. Kind of. But still, fuck Andrew Ladd and his perfect gay friends.

“The game on Saturday was great,” he types back angrily, “not that it’s any of your business. If Ladd wants to fucking imply something he should do it himself, to my face,” and hits send.

He fumes for a while, but he doesn’t have time to work into a real rage because they have a game.

At the end of the second, the Catamounts are down 3-2, and Cam blocks a wicked slapshot by a New Hampshire D-man with his foot. He finishes his shift, but his face is white, and he needs to be helped off the bench for intermission. Shit shit shit.

After conferring with the trainers, Coach comes back into the locker room. “Cam’s out for the game, maybe longer. We’ll figure out what do in the long term if it comes to that, but for the rest of this game, Jared and Ladd, I want you two taking turns on Kes’s wing.”

Ryan bites down into his mouthguard. This is hockey. Nothing else matters.

His line plays okay, if not great, for the rest of the game. They don’t allow a goal, at least. Ryan feels like his head is spinning trying to adjust his game to Jared, then Ladd, then Jared again, both of whom play different games than Cam does. He maybe even plays a little better with Ladd on his wing, honestly, though that’s probably because Ladd isn’t settled with Alex yet.

They push it in the third, but the bounces don’t go their way. They end up losing 3-2, and the next day, they find out Cam will be out for weeks at least with a broken foot.

He sources his bad mood to the loss when he turns down Jane’s invitation to movie night and ends up hanging out on his laptop killing little electronic men.

He dreads practice, and with good reason. The first thing Coach says to him is, “Kesler, I want to start Ladd on your wing today.”

The worst part about it is that Ladd fits in almost as well as Cam did with him and Chris, after only six minutes of ice time together during the game and two drills during practice. Coach doesn’t even suggest trying Jared there.

So that’s how it’s going to be, but just for a few weeks. Ryan can put on his big girl panties and deal.

And then he has to deal with wondering what bothers him more, that he has to play with Ladd or that his internal monologue sounds like Jane.

–

After practice the next day, they walk to GSA together, and Ryan tells Ladd about a play he’s been wanting to try. Cam couldn’t pull it off, but Ladd is bigger than Cam, so Kesler thinks he can do it. The walk doesn’t seem as long as usual. And it’s not bad, talking to Ladd. About hockey, anyway.

“Did I notice you guys talking to each other voluntarily?” Jane leans over and whispers during the meeting. Ryan rolls his eyes and resists the urge to look across the circle at Ladd.

“Yeah, about hockey,” Ryan says. “I told you Cam broke his foot. Coach moved Ladd up to my left wing.”

“Oh? How’s that going?”

“It’s fine. Why does it sound like you’re talking about something other than hockey?”

“I’m just saying, you have to play together —”

“We’ve always had to play together. Now we have to do it more often. I still hate him, Jane.”

“Really?”

“What the fuck do you mean, really?”

“Shut up!” Erin yells.

Ryan and Jane look down at their laps. When Ryan looks up, Ladd is looking at them and smiling. Oh, of course, perfect Andrew Ladd never gets called out for whispering. Ryan looks at the floor and goes over penalty kill plays in his head.

–

Saturday’s game is actually kind of awesome. Ryan feels like he has the puck twice as much as usual because Ladd’s helping win board battles and getting the puck back to him faster, and he’s more likely to muscle guys off the puck than get muscled off.

If his finish were near as good as Cam’s, Ryan might have to worry about this move being permanent, but for now he can enjoy some of the benefits of his new winger.

Not that Ladd has bad hands or anything, because in the second period, Ryan has the puck on his stick and spots Ladd open near the net. It only takes a split second to decide to send
him a sweet pass that Ladd easily lifts past the goalie’s outstretched leg, and it’s a good goal, and it’s great.

Ladd comes barreling into him and throws his arm around Ryan, and then everyone else is pushing them together. Even though there’s all this equipment between them, Ryan can still feel Ladd against him, and it’s like he’s going to keep feeling him there for the rest of the period. Briefly, Ryan looks at Ladd’s smiling mouth and thinks “my dick was in there” before he pulls back and skates quickly towards the bench

This is terrible. Hockey is for hockey, not thinking about bathroom blow jobs. Because he’s not getting hard in his jock strap. He’s not. Even when he glances over and sees Ladd shooting some Gatorade into his mouth.

After the game Ladd just keeps beaming at him and slapping him on the back and leaning in close, like one goal has made them BFFs or something. But it was the game-winning goal, and they did play well together, and Ryan doesn’t want to fuck that up, especially not with Coach watching them approvingly. So he doesn’t shove Ladd off of him, and he doesn’t tell him to back the fuck off.

Ryan tries to sit as far away from Ladd as possible when the team goes to dinner later, but somehow he ends up wedged in right next to him. And Christ, their thighs are pressed against each other, and when Ladd puts his napkin on his lap and spreads it out, his fingers practically brush Ryan’s crotch.

Ryan starts making plans to duck out early.

He goes so far as to text Jane for help.

Ladd leans over so far into Ryan’s space they’re practically breathing the same air. “Who’re you texting that’s so important?”

“Uh, Jane, we’re doing a thing later,” Ryan says convincingly.

“Jane? Gonna get lucky tonight, Kes?” Chris asks from across the table.

“That’s none of your business,” Ryan says.

The guys hoot and laugh at that, before losing interest in favor of making fun of Alex’s crush on the waitress.

“So does Jane know she’s your beard?” Ladd asks under his breath.

“Shut. Up,” Ryan says very softly and carefully.

Ladd throws an arm around his shoulders. “Kind of hypocritical of you, isn’t it?”

“Seriously. Shut up. You wouldn’t know anything about it.”

“You think I’m an idiot, don’t you?” Ladd asks. “I don’t know about this, I didn’t know —”

Ryan digs his knuckles into Ladd’s thigh as close as he can figure to where Ladd blocked a shot in the second. “Stop. Talking.”

Ladd shuts up, thankfully.

Ryan presses hard once more and stands up, throwing Ladd’s arm off his shoulder. He tosses some money on the table and walks out without a word to anyone.

–

He paces outside Jane’s dorm until she comes down to let him in. He must look pissed because she just walks with him silently up to her room and moves some pillows out of the way so he can crash on her bed. “Fuck Andrew Ladd.”

“I’ll pass,” Jane says, sitting down next to him. “I think that’s more up your alley.”

“Fuck no, it’s not,” Ryan says. “I can’t believe I ever —”

“Ever what?”

“He blew me in a bathroom in New York, and I jerked him off, and —” Ryan sighs and closes his eyes. He’d wanted it to happen again.

“I knew it! I knew you liked him!”

“I don’t! I just wanted to get laid, and suddenly he was on his knees, and —” that had never happened to him before. “It was stupid, and he’s an asshole.”

“He hasn’t really been an asshole lately, though, has he?” Jane asks.

“Only because we’re on the same line now. It fucks up the team if we don’t get along.”

Jane sighs and rests her head on his shoulder. “So what happened tonight, then? Bad game?”

“Well, no,” Ryan says. “Actually, it was a really good game.”

She still doesn’t really care about hockey, but he describes it to her, getting really excited with all the details of their goal and how awesome it was.

“Yeah, what an asshole,” Jane says, obviously confused.

Ryan tries to explain the argument he and Ladd had, but the only thing Jane says is, “Why did you wanna leave early? You love hanging with the team.”

“What, I can’t want to spend time with you?” Ryan asks.

“Not when you can be soaking up the testosterone or reliving your heroism on the ice, no.”

“Ladd was…he was being weird, and I didn’t want to deal with that,” Ryan says, shifting on the bed uncomfortably.

“What kind of weird?”

“All buddy-buddy fake shit,” Ryan says.

“You said you’re on the same line now and you have to get along. Maybe he was just … feeling the camaraderie?”

Ryan snorts. “Maybe he just wants to fuck with me.”

“Maybe he just wants to fuck you.”

Ryan shoves her a little. “Don’t be stupid.”

She shoves him back, hard. “You’re the one being stupid. He blew you. In a bathroom.”

“I’m not going to be his gay chicken partner, or whatever the fuck,” Ryan says. “So that after, he can just go back to being straight and smug about how he’s so tolerant he even fucked a poor, closeted jock.”

“Ryan, I’m sure he wouldn’t…” Jane starts, but Ryan cuts her off.

“I don’t want to talk about him anymore. Can we just go to sleep?”

“Sure,” Jane says, even though it’s still early for a Saturday night.

–

Ladd and a couple of the D-men are in the kitchen of the house when Ryan gets home the next morning. He’s wearing the same clothes from yesterday, and he knows his hair is all flat on one side.

“Wow, spending the night, Kes? That’s a big step,” Mark says with a smirk.

Ryan shrugs and pretends not to notice the way Ladd’s lips are pressed into a line, or how he’s staring at his coffee. Like he gets to judge Ryan at all.

“I’m just gonna go grab another couple hours,” Ryan says, heading for the stairs. He doesn’t need to hang around to hear the ‘long night’ jokes.

While he’s lying in bed trying to fall asleep, he gets a brilliant idea to get Ladd to leave him alone for good.

Ladd does back off a little in the next few days, which is good, but Ryan needs to be sure.

“Hey,” he says to Ladd after practice, “we should talk a little bit about the line. My room after dinner?”

Ladd looks surprised, but he agrees with a smile.

Ladd drops onto his bed, like, the second he gets into the room and sprawls out on it. Ryan locks the door as subtly as he can and totally doesn’t check out the way Ladd’s shirt has ridden up to expose a strip of his stomach.

“So we have some…issues to work out,” Ryan begins.

Ladd laughs. “That’s one way to put it.”

Ryan debates for a second whether or not he should drag Ladd to the edge of the bed and spread his knees, or if he should climb onto the bed himself. In the end he decides to save his own knees; he’s gotta play hockey tomorrow.

He gets on the bed and crawls between Ladd’s sprawled legs.

“Shove up a bit.”

“Wha?” Ladd says, raising his head. Ryan plants his hands on Ladd’s thighs and pushes him so they’ll both fit on the bed.

“This will work better for me with less talking from you.”

Then he goes for Ladd’s zipper.

Ladd makes an aborted gesture, like he’s going to stop him, but then realizes what’s going on and just lets Ryan go, lifting his hips so Ryan can pull down his jeans and boxers. When Ladd opens his mouth to say something, Ryan wraps his hand around his cock and that shuts him up quickly.

“I’m going to blow you, and you’re not going to say anything,” Ryan says as he jacks Ladd’s cock until it’s hard enough. “Except maybe ‘oh god.’”

Ladd nods, his mouth hanging open a bit, and it looks so dumb, but Ryan also maybe wants to bite it. He leans down and licks Ladd’s dick instead.

Ladd makes this sighing noise, and the muscles in his thighs all tense up. Ryan licks it again, a little more thoroughly this time. “Oh fuck,” Ladd breathes.

Ryan doesn’t have a lot of experience, but he does have some, and he goes about making this the best, slowest blowjob he can possibly give.

Despite his warning, Ladd is just talking up a storm — a constant stream of “Oh god”s and “Oh fuck yeah Ryan just like that”s interspersed with inarticulate groans. Ryan would tell him to shut it, but apparently his dick thinks it’s fucking great. He’s so hard in his jeans he’s almost tempted to speed this up so he can get off. Almost.

Ryan’s lazily sucking on the head of Ladd’s dick, his hand loose around the base, when Ladd reaches down and tangles his hand in Ryan’s hair. Ryan almost bats it away, but Ladd doesn’t pull or push Ryan’s head, he just lets it rest there, kind of petting almost, and it doesn’t feel bad, so Ryan lets it go.

“Ryan, fuck,” Ladd says, and Ryan resists the urge to smirk around Ladd’s cock. Choking would be bad right now.

He rubs himself through his jeans, just to take the edge off, and then reaches his hand up, pressing two of his fingers against Ladd’s mouth.

“What, you said I could —” Ladd starts to say, not getting what Ryan wants until he pushes them inside. Then he catches on quickly, sucking on Ryan’s fingers like Ryan’s sucking on his dick. Like he could make Ryan come from this. Ryan kind of worries that he could, so he pulls them out. They make a wet popping sound, and then Ladd’s back to sighing and swearing.

He tenses up a little when Ryan circles his hole with one finger, but he relaxes quickly. Ryan’s kind of surprised at how quickly, but there might have been some creative girls in this position before him.

Ladd isn’t even saying words anymore, just groaning that sometimes tapers off into panting, and his hand in Ryan’s hair is clenching and unclenching in the same rhythm that Kesler is using pushing his finger in and out of his ass.

He takes Ladd’s cock deeper into his throat and adds a second finger. It takes some coordination, but he isn’t an athlete for nothing.

Ladd’s groans have mutated into whines now, which Ryan will totally make fun of him for later, provided they don’t make him come in his jeans. Ladd’s hips are moving restlessly, which makes it harder to suck his cock in rhythm, and Ryan is kind of out of hands. Instead, he relaxes his throat a little and crooks his fingers in Ladd’s ass.

“Oh fuck, Ryan. Ryan Ryan Ryan,” Ladd babbles. His hips thrust, and his cock throbs, and Ryan doesn’t need his choked off “Gonna come” to know that.

He’d planned on spitting — contemptuously even — but he’s so fucking turned on right now he’s having trouble remembering what the plan is supposed to be. He swallows until he can’t anymore, and Ladd’s jizz is dribbling out of the corner of his mouth and down his chin a little bit.

“Holy shit,” Ladd says, when he’s done and Ryan has removed his mouth from his dick. He wiggles his fingers in Ladd’s ass a little, just to fuck with him, but Ladd just arches his back and groans, and Ryan stares at his abs exposed by his rucked up t-shirt while he slowly, finally, takes his fingers out.

“Come here. Come here right now,” Ladd commands, and usually Ryan would tell him to go to hell, but Ladd is grabbing his arms and dragging him, and then he’s kissing Ryan on the mouth, and his tongue is licking up the come on Ryan’s face, and Ryan finds himself kissing back.

Ladd’s just kissing him, and holding onto Ryan’s arms so he’s pinned there, like his dick isn’t right there with nobody touching it. He was supposed to be calm, cool and collected, not dry humping Ladd’s thigh. At the very least, he hopes the denim is chafing Ladd, because he’s pretty sure he’s going to die if he doesn’t get to come soon. And if he comes in his pants, he’s going to have to kill himself.

Finally Ladd gets the message and reaches down to unzip Ryan’s jeans, and Ryan scrabbles to help him, and he swears he can feel the bastard smiling against his lips. But before he can get too worked up about it, Ladd’s hand is finally, finally touching him. He keeps kissing him slow and deep, like he’s got all day even, while he’s working Ryan’s cock hard and fast with his hand.

For Ryan, it’s the most complicated form of multitasking out there, and Ladd swallows most of his gasps and moans until Ryan digs his fingers into Ladd’s wrist and comes in his hand. Ladd keeps stroking him through the waves of the orgasm, slower now, so Ryan can catch his breath.

Ryan keeps waiting for Ladd to pull away and say something douchey that will make Ryan want to punch him, but he doesn’t. He just keeps kissing Ryan slow and deep, making satisfied little “hmms” into Ryan’s mouth. One of Ladd’s hands is in Ryan’s hair again, and somehow Ryan has got one arm around Ladd’s neck and the other hand resting on Ladd’s ass.

Ryan kind of loses track of time waiting for Ladd to stop, but when Ladd starts kissing Ryan’s neck, Ryan realizes he isn’t planning on it.

This isn’t how this was supposed to go.

Ladd reattaches their mouths before Ryan can come up with a new plan, and it’s very distracting how his hand is stroking Ryan’s hip.

Ryan finally manages to pull away and say, “I’ve got … homework.” It comes out way more husky and breathless than he meant it.

Ladd pouts, actually full on pouts, and says, “Do it later,” and pulls Ryan back toward his mouth.

It would be so easy to go and just keep making out, but no. That’s not what Ryan wants. That’s not what he planned. He puts his hand on Ladd’s chest — and wow, it’s really warm and solid — to keep space between them.

“No.” He clears his throat and tries again. “No, you should go.”

Ladd pouts, and he should look ridiculous, but he doesn’t. Ryan hates him. Really.

They clean up and put their pants back on, and then Ladd grabs Ryan by the neck and kisses him again, briefly.

“Later,” Ladd says into Ryan’s mouth, and it doesn’t sound like he’s weirded out or planning to leave Ryan alone. It sounds like a promise of the exact opposite.

Ryan may have made a tactical error here.

As soon as Ladd is out the door, Ryan opens his laptop and shoots an IM to Jane.

Ryan: i think i made a tactical error.
Jane: Oh honey, what did you do?

He wishes he couldn’t hear that exact pitying tone she’d say that in.

Ryan: had sex with ladd.

He stares at the screen. The words somehow reinforce what happened. He wants to delete them or something, but he hits send before he comes up with some stupid euphemism.

There’s a long pause before Jane replies, and Ryan has a sinking feeling it’s because she’s laughing at him.

Jane: Not a tactic you were planning on employing?
Ryan: no it was it just … didn’t turn out right.
Jane: It was bad?

Ryan can’t believe he’s about to type this.

Ryan: no. it was good. um. really good.
Jane: And that’s bad?
Ryan: yes!
Jane: Why?
Ryan: because he’s going to want to do it again.
Jane: …

That’s all he gets for a minute.

Jane: Half the GSA wishes they had your problems.

Jane continues before Ryan can respond that they are welcome to his problems.

Jane: Look, what would be so bad about doing it again?
Ryan: it was supposed to freak him out and make him back off! i don’t like him!
Jane: You kinda do though.
Ryan: i do not.

God, he thought Jane was his friend.

Jane: That’s not true, and even supposing it is, does he annoy you when you’re having sex?

Ryan glares at the screen.

Ryan: no but what if he starts thinking i want to hang out not during sex?
Ryan: i practically had to kick him out of my room tonight as it was.
Jane: Outside of sex like at practice?
Jane: Or during games?
Jane: Or at GSA?
Jane: or when you’re living in the same house?
Ryan: YES. that’s too much time!!

He doesn’t see how she doesn’t see the problem.

Jane: Or going to the same parties?
Jane: Or having the same friends?
Ryan: those weren’t my ideas.
Jane: You could have said NO, Ryan.
Ryan: i gotta go do my homework

Ryan signs off without waiting for a response.

–

Ryan pretty much ignores everything for a few days. He goes to class, he goes to practice, and he doesn’t really talk, and he’s trying not to think. He skips the GSA meeting and goes back to his room. After the meeting, he gets a text from Jane saying, “where were you? everyone wondering. andrew asked about you.”

“Just tired,” Ryan sends back. He wants to know what Ladd said, but he can’t bring himself to ask.

He realizes Ladd will be back soon if the meeting’s over, and he hurries to grab his coat and head to the dining hall for dinner so he can have a little while longer without dealing with him. But Ladd’s trodding up the steps when Ryan opens the door.

“Oh, hey!” Ladd says. “Missed you at GSA.”

“Yeah, I had — other stuff,” Ryan lies.

“Yeah.” Ladd nods. “You going to dinner?”

“Um, yeah,” Ryan says.

“Mind if I come with?”

“Free country,” Ryan shrugs, and he keeps walking toward the dining hall. Ladd falls into step with him, but he doesn’t say anything for a few minutes. Ryan knows it won’t stay like that through dinner, but he can hope.

“Jane’s worried about you,” Ladd says eventually.

“Jane can tell me things herself,” Ryan snaps back.

“So why is Jane worried about you?” Ladd asks as they load up on mashed potatoes.

“I have no idea,” Kesler says. “She’s just Jane.”

“You been avoiding her like you’ve been avoiding me?”

“No! And I haven’t been avoiding you. I’ve been treating you like normal.”

“Do the blowjobs fit into that normal category? Because I’d be okay with that,” Ladd says, so casually that the guy cutting the pork chops does a double take.

Ryan grips the edges of his tray so hard his knuckles turn white.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asks through a clenched jaw.

“What the hell is wrong with me? What the hell is wrong with you? You drag me into your room and give me the best blowjob of my life, then you —”

The guy cutting the pork chops is not even pretending to pay attention to his job now.

“I am not talking about this here,” Ryan says.

“Fine,” Ladd says, “let’s go.”

They wind up in the staff parking lot behind the dining hall, since it’s the closest thing to private they’re going to get. There’s no way he’s having this conversation in the house, or anywhere else someone else might hear them. Someone besides the guy with the pork chops and whoever was paying attention in line.

Fuck.

“Fuck you,” Ryan says.

“We could have by now, but you keep blowing me off,” Ladd says, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s been a hit parade of dick moves.”

“Dick moves? Me?” Ryan says, outraged.

“Yes, you,” Ladd says. “You left me in a bathroom after I gave you a blowjob. I keep trying to be nice to you, and you ignore it, and then you yell at me, and then you gave me a blowjob, and it was great, and I thought we had a pretty good time, but now you’re treating me like I’m contagious.”

Put like that, it does sound pretty dickish. Of course Andrew Ladd wouldn’t bother to figure out the reasons why Ryan did anything.

“The blowjob was a mistake,” Ryan says, crossing his own arms to match Ladd’s. “I shouldn’t have done it. This isn’t going to be a thing.”

“The blowjob was awesome,” Ladd corrects.

Ryan wants to hit him.

“And why can’t it be a thing? The sex would be great, we hang out all the time anyway. It’d be a great thing.”

“It can’t be a thing because I can’t stand you! You fucking make me crazy and I just want to —” Ryan drops his arms and balls his hands into fists.

“Kiss me?” Ladd smiles in what he probably thinks is a charming way. “Blow me? Throw me down and fuck me? Because I’d be okay with that.”

“And then when you get sick of that, or it gets too hard, and you decide to go back to being straight?”

“I’m not straight.”

Ryan rolls his eyes. “Yes, you are.”

“Okay, yes, kind of. But maybe not entirely. I can be flexible.”

“What are you — you can’t just decide that!”

“Why not? I mean, I want to kiss you, and I liked blowing you, and I’d like to try all that other stuff, and that’s not exactly straight, is it?” Ladd shrugs.

Ryan wants to kill everything.

“Fine, so when it gets too tough, you’ll flex yourself right back to dating girls and pretending this is just a phase,” Ryan says. “And I’ll be right back here.”

Ladd just stares at him. “Wow, you actually think I’m that much of a douche?”

Ryan doesn’t say anything.

“You — Fuck, you don’t even know me, because you won’t give me a fucking chance. You’ve just decided that I’m this way or that way, and you don’t even want to find out if maybe you’re wrong. And you are wrong.”

Ladd actually looks angry, and Ryan shoves his hands in his pockets. It’s windy, and they’re getting cold.

Ryan doesn’t know what to say, so he doesn’t say anything. He wishes this conversation was over. He wishes he could just go to bed. He wishes he never met Andrew fucking Ladd.

Ladd makes a strangled sort of noise, and then Ryan is being pushed back against the wall of the building, hard enough that his shoulders twinge. He struggles, but Ladd’s putting all of his weight into holding his shoulders, and he’s glaring. Ryan tries avoiding looking at his eyes, but they’re too close.

“Just give me a chance, Ryan,” Ladd says. Ladd has never called him Ryan, except when they were in Ryan’s bed, and it kinda makes his stomach do a weird plunge. Ryan wants to say “Fuck you.” He wants to scream it, but all that comes out is,

“I can’t.”

Ladd sighs and looks down at his feet, but he doesn’t let up on Ryan’s shoulders at all. When he looks back at Ryan, he looks determined, and Ryan has a bad feeling about this.

“One week. Give me one week to prove to you that I am serious about this, okay? And then if you still don’t believe me, we can break up, and I won’t bother you about it again, I promise.”

Ryan is already shaking his head.

“Please, Ryan.”

Ryan stares over Ladd’s shoulder, refusing to make eye contact. “One week, and then you’ll leave me alone?”

“If you want me to,” Ladd says.

Ryan rolls his eyes and accidentally ends up looking back at Ladd, who’s grinning. He would be.

“One week.”

Ladd smiles even wider, like Ryan just gave him the Hart and the Selke at once, and it makes him uncomfortable. He doesn’t even realize right away that Ladd has stepped back, letting Ryan stand on his own.

“Well, come on,” Ladd says, holding out his hand.

“What? Where?” Ryan stares at Ladd’s hand like it might fall off at any moment.

“We still need to get dinner.”

“I’m not holding your hand,” Ryan says. “Just because we’re going to pretend to date —”

“— not pretending,” Ladd corrects.

“— doesn’t mean I’m coming out to the entire school.”

“Okay,” Ladd says. “That’s fair. I mean, I would, if you wanted me to. You should know that.” He drops his hand back to his side, thankfully.

Ryan starts walking back to the door. He actually is kinda hungry now. Ladd falls into step next to him, close enough that their shoulders brush.

“The GSA, though,” he says. “I can hold your hand there, right?”

“Yeah, sure,” Ryan says. He’ll deal with that when they get there. He can’t believe he’s having this conversation.

It’s weird to realize that Ladd can be sort of nice, and really funny, when he’s not being a giant jerk. This is apparently the guy that the rest of the team and the GSA love. This is Seabs’s best friend.

By the end of dinner, Ryan’s more okay with this week he agreed to. So it won’t be horribly awful, and he’ll probably get laid, and when it’s over, Ladd will leave him alone.

There’s really no way to lose.

–

Jane almost chokes on her falafel when Ryan explains it at lunch the next day. “Sorry, you what?”

“Shouldn’t you be pleased? You were the one trying to convince me that I like him.” Ryan glares at her.

“You do like him, Ryan,” she says, when she’s taken a sip of water and cleaned up the food from her lap. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have agreed to this. I’m surprised you agreed to it at all, and I’m worried that you’re so fucking repressed about him that you’re gonna end up making yourself even more miserable.”

Ryan glares some more and stabs his shawerma with his fork.

“I admit that he’s not as repulsive when he’s trying to be nice so he can get laid, but you’re wrong. I get laid for a week, and then I get Ladd leaving me alone: simple as that.”

Jane opens her mouth to say something, and Kesler interrupts her.

“He’s straight, Jane. You said yourself the first time we met: he makes a great pretend boyfriend.”

Jane closes her mouth and looks down at her plate.

“Okay,” she says. “Clearly I’m not going to change your mind. But promise me one thing, okay?”

“Sure,” Ryan says, because he really hates it when Jane looks sad.

“Just, if you’re gonna do this, then really do this. Go all in. No holding back. Promise?”

“Promise,” Ryan says, and wonders yet again how she talks him into these kind of things. “I gotta get back to campus for practice. See you later?”

“See you at GSA tomorrow?”

Ryan remembers what Ladd said about GSA and considers making up some excuse. But probably neither of them will let him get away with that.

“Sure,” he says, and gives her a pat on the head as he leaves.

When he gets to practice, Ladd is waiting for him outside of the rink.

“I am not coming out to the team,” Ryan says when he walks up.

“No, I know,” Ladd says. “I wouldn’t ask you to. But…” He chews on his bottom lip a little and looks unsure. “You should tell them you aren’t dating Jane.”

“Why?” Ryan asks. “I mean, I never told them I was dating her.”

“Yeah, but —” Ladd tries.

“And it would be really weird if I walked in and made some weird announcement about how I’m not dating her.”

Ladd sighs. “Fine, but if it comes up, don’t let them go on thinking the wrong thing.”

“Yeah, fine, okay,” Ryan says. It’s not like his imaginary sex life comes up that often.

Practice goes well enough. Ladd’s fitting in better and better on Ryan’s line, and they even get a couple of approving nods from the coach during the drills.

Locker room talk after is the usual: Jared’s failing attempts to pick up girls and Jonesy’s latest crush. Ryan stays out of it for the most part, just focusing on getting dressed, until Tim asks, “Dude, what’s that on your shirt? Jizz?”

“What?” Ryan asks, glancing down. There’s a small stain under the ‘y’ in Hockey. “It’s tahini sauce, you dumbass. I got lunch at that Middle Eastern place.”

“Middle Eastern?” Tim asks, pulling a face.

“It’s not bad,” Ryan defends. “Jane likes the falafel.”

“Your girlfriend has you whipped if you’re eating that crap,” Tim says, shaking his head.

“Just because it’s not a hamburger or boiled potato doesn’t mean it’s crap, Timmy. Try branching out a little.” He can feel Ladd staring at the back of his neck. “And she’s not my girlfriend.”

“No strings attached, that’s the way to go!” Jared crows.

The conversation moves on before Ryan can correct him. Not that he tries very hard.

Still, he shrugs at Ladd, who gives him a weird sort of grin and shake of the head. He doesn’t look pissed or anything, which is good.

Not that Ryan cares, except maybe he does, since Ladd’s his temporary boyfriend and all.

Ladd is finished dressing before Ryan is, as usual, but he waits until Ryan’s done and walks out with him.

“Did you do the geology worksheet yet?” Ryan shakes his head. “Wanna do it in my room after dinner? Jonesy’s got night class.”

“Sure.” Ryan shrugs. He needs to get it done, and if he’s reading it right, he might get orgasms out of it too.

“Awesome.” Ladd swings an arm around Kesler’s shoulder and pulls him in for a rough hug. Ryan knows it doesn’t look any different from what guys normally do with each other. It’s not suspicious at all, but it still makes his heart pound.

Back at the house, Ryan gets his geology stuff from his room, takes a deep breath, and heads down to Ladd’s. He’s never seen Ladd’s room in the light before, but it doesn’t look much different from any other room in the house.

Ryan drops his notebook on the floor while Ladd closes his door. Ryan hears the lock click and feels a thrill run through his limbs. Stupid biological reactions.

He’s about to settle himself on the floor when Ladd pulls him by the arm, shoves him against the door, and kisses him.

“I’ve been wanting to do that all day,” he says after a few minutes.

“Oh,” Ryan says. It’s dumb, but it’s all he can think of to say. He can’t say he has been too, because he hasn’t. Mostly he’s been nervous and jumpy about the whole thing. The promise of orgasms had mostly been an abstract thing to calm himself down.

It’s not abstract any more. He pulls Ladd back against him and catches Ladd smiling before their lips meet again. Ryan doesn’t quite understand why he looks so happy, but it’s kind of infectious. He doesn’t even try to think of an STD joke to go with that.

Ladd pulls back when Ryan starts pushing his hips up against his, but he manages to avoid whining about it.

“The geology thing wasn’t just a line to get you in here,” he says, even as his thumb rubs a spot behind Ryan’s ear. “We should probably do that before I blow out all my brain cells. Or before you blow them out.” He actually waggles his eyebrows when he says that, and Jane would be so proud: Ryan doesn’t even consider punching him.

Despite his words, Ladd leans in and kisses Ryan again. If he doesn’t stop rubbing that spot behind Ryan’s ear soon, they aren’t going to get to geology. Ryan didn’t even know that spot was sensitive.

“Geology,” he says into Ladd’s mouth without pulling away. “The sooner we do it, the sooner I can blow you.”

Ladd pulls away and grins. “I like the way you think.”

They sprawl on the floor with their books and notebooks. Ladd hooks his foot over Ryan’s ankle.

“That’s not conducive to getting homework done,” Ryan admonishes.

Ladd leans his head close to Ryan’s and whispers, “It’s incentive.” Ryan shivers, and he knows Ladd can feel it, but he doesn’t even care.

By the time they’re halfway done with the worksheet, Ladd is rubbing his foot up and down Ryan’s calf, and Ryan is wondering why he needs to pass geology anyway. What does a professional hockey player need to know about volcanoes? Nothing, that’s what.

Ryan finishes the third to last question and looks over at Ladd. His head is bent over his book, and he’s biting his lip in concentration. His neck is right there, and Ryan officially cannot think about lava floes anymore. He puts his pen down, leans over, and licks Ladd’s neck.

Ladd groans and turns onto his side, tilting his head back to give Ryan better access. Ryan can work with that. He shimmies closer and starts kissing his way up Ladd’s neck to his ear.

“We’re not done,” Ladd says, but his hand has already made its way around Ryan and under his shirt, stroking the small of his back.

“Fuck geology,” Ryan mumbles.

“Mmm, I’d rather fuck you,” Ladd says, and flips them neatly so he’s on top of Ryan.

Even though the idea speeds blood flow to his dick, Ryan snorts. “You’ve been gay for like three days and already you want to try the advanced stuff?”

There’s no real malice behind it, and he keeps moving his hands over Ladd’s skin, but he hesitates briefly because maybe he’s not supposed to say that shit this week.

“Bisexuals exist, Ryan,” Ladd says before tugging on Ryan’s earlobe with his teeth. Ryan would respond, but he’s busy swallowing the sounds that elicits.

Ladd is heavy and warm on top of him, and Ryan never expected something like that to feel so good. He’s hard in his jeans, but he could probably spend all night like this, just making out, and go to bed satisfied.

Ladd moves his hips, and his dick brushes Ryan’s and oh, maybe not after all. Ladd’s hands are moving under Ryan’s shirt, and the carpet is rough against his back. It feels almost good, because everything feels good right now, but it probably won’t feel that great tomorrow.

“Bed,” Ryan gasps.

“Yeah,” Ladd says against Ryan’s jaw. It takes another minute before he finally moves off of Ryan and drags him to his bed, ditching a few articles of clothing on the way.

–

He shouldn’t be surprised that Ladd’s really cuddly afterwards, because he’s already experienced post-coital makeouts with the guy, but now he’s just sprawled on top of Ryan, tracing patterns on his cooling skin with a finger and watching the goosebumps pop up in their wake.

It’s — it’s nice. There’s nothing overtly sexual about it, and that kind of weirds Ryan out, but he’s being a boyfriend, so he tries not to tense up or be weird about it.

It’s actually kind of comfortable, his arms around Ladd’s waist, and his thumbs brushing the base of his spine. His orgasm made him sleepy, and Ladd’s warmth on top of him might put him over the edge into a doze. Before that happens, though, Ladd sighs into his neck and says, “Jonesy’s gonna be back soon,” without lifting his head.

Ryan makes some inarticulate sound of unhappiness with the idea of moving.

“Wish you could stay here all night,” Ladd says into Ryan’s skin. “But unless you wanna come out to the team really dramatically…”

It’s a good point, but Ryan is surprised how appealing spending an entire night with Ladd sounds. Without meaning to, he racks his brain for some time and place they could, but can’t think of any, unless one of their roommates unexpectedly goes out of town. If they changed road trip roommates by two weeks from now, but … Ryan puts that thought out of his head. There won’t be any need, two weeks from now.

Ladd rolls off of him, and Ryan shivers, suddenly exposed to the cold air. He pushes himself up with one arm, but the other is still trapped under Ladd. Turning to tell him so means detouring to kiss him, and then he gets sidetracked.

Ladd pushes him away gently after a time. “Get dressed before I ravish you again.”

“I think that was the other way around,” Ryan says as he’s searching for his pants.

“We can try both, next time.” Ladd hasn’t even bothered to put on anything more than his boxers.

“You might wanna open the windows before Jonesy gets back,” Ryan tells him. The room smells strongly of jizz and sweat.

Ladd waves his arm lazily. “I’ll just tell him I had a marathon jerk off session. He’ll give me some grief, but nothing I can’t handle.”

“See you tomorrow?” It comes out as a question, even though Ryan knows he’ll see Ladd tomorrow.

“Definitely,” Ladd says. “Come here.”

Ryan goes and lets Ladd pull him down for one more kiss before leaving. On his way up the stairs, he hears Jonesy coming in, but feels too blissed out to stress almost over being caught.

–

When Ryan wakes up and turns on his laptop the next morning, he has an email from Facebook.

Please confirm that you are in It’s Complicated with Andrew Ladd.

There’s a message with it.

You don’t have to, but no one will think anything weird, I promise.

Ryan swallows and goes to take a shower without hitting confirm or deny.

He knows, objectively, that Ladd is right. No one is suspicious of Seabs and his Duncs saying they’re married on Facebook. Tim’s Facebook lists him as in a relationship with one of his teammates from high school, and Jared and Jonesy list themselves as in a relationship with each other. They do it all the time, and the guys on the team will probably think it’s funny.

It still makes Ryan queasy. He finishes his shower and gets dressed, and he checks the rest of his email, and his blogs, and the assignment for his first class of the day, and the whole time his Facebook page is asking him to confirm or deny. He thinks about calling Jane, but he knows what she’d say.

Finally, when he absolutely has to leave or he’ll be late to class, he presses confirm, slams his laptop shut, and walks out.

He gets four texts from Jane in the next hour even though he knows she’s in Psych.

The first is just a series of exclamation points. The second soon after says ‘I’m so proud’.

About half an hour later, he gets “how have I never realized how you jocks embrace the homoerotic subtext of everything you do?” He’s not sure if she means the rest of the teams’ marital statuses or if someone said something about his status — their status — specifically.

“No seriously, I think I’ve got the next two years to work on my senior thesis.”

He’s tapping out a reply to all of them as he walks out of his world lit seminar, only to get yanked to the near wall.

“Hey, what the — Jane? Isn’t your class, like, across campus?”

“I wanted to talk to you,” she says.

“So you teleported? Jesus. It’s not that big of a deal.”

“Um, yeah, it kinda is, when three days ago you were still insisting you hated him.”

“I still hate him,” Ryan says automatically, but even he can hear that it sounds perfunctory.

“Sure you do.” Jane rolls her eyes. “Not to mention, I’ve been fielding questions from everyone in GSA all morning. You better watch out for Ben. He called dibs on Andrew if he ever decided to experiment.”

“I think I can take Ben,” Ryan says. Jane raises her eyebrows, and he realizes how that sounded. Fuck. “Besides,” he says, “he already did that experimenting with Seabs.”

“I know,” Jane says. “But you don’t even sound jealous when you say it anymore.”

“I was never —” Ryan cuts himself off. “There’s no reason for me to be jealous. And besides, Seabs has probably proposed to Duncan by now.”

Jane looks like she’s trying not to laugh at him, and she pats him on the arm. “You have a break now, right? Let’s get some coffee.”

“Yeah, I mean, I have to do the last few questions on my geology homework.”

“It’s Rocks for Jocks, I’ll see if I can help. Otherwise, just write something down, and I’m sure you’ll get credit.”

“So what happened last night?” Jane asks once they’re settled at a table with some coffee.

“Nothing.” Ryan shrugs. “We did homework, we had sex, then his roommate came back from night class, and I went to bed.”

“And somewhere in there he convinced you to change your Facebook status?”

“He didn’t talk about it. The request was there when I woke up. He just said no one would think anything suspicious, which they won’t, I don’t think. I haven’t seen any of the responses yet.”

Jane pulls out her phone, even though she knows he could check it on his, and hands it to him. It’s already open to his Facebook page.

It’s been liked twelve times, and the comments are mostly the guys from the team commenting with stuff like “Tell Laddy he can’t fuck it up until Cam’s foot gets fixed.”

“Coach’ll be so pleased.”

“NOW YOU CAN JOIN US ON DATE NIGHT!!!”

So that’s a relief. Out of curiosity, he clicks over to Ladd’s profile, where a lot of the same theme of comments are coming from the guys, in addition to more from the GSA, and it’s been liked by thirty people. He suddenly has a preview of what the meeting is going to be like.

“But Andy, I thought what we had MEANT something to you!!!! ;)” has been left by no less than six people, four guys and two girls.

Halfway through the comments, he finds one from Seabs that says, “I’m glad you’ve finally moved on after I broke your heart last year. I know I’m a tough man to get over, but Kes should keep you on your toes. ;) xoxoxo”

There’s also more than one volunteer for a threesome, but it’s all over the top enough that no one on the team will think much of the comments from the guys.

“Oh,” Ryan says. “So I guess we’re good, then.”

“You’re fine,” Jane says. “I wonder how many of the other ‘fake’ gay marriages on Facebook are genuine.”

She’s got that ‘making notes for subject headings’ look on her face again, so Ryan knows he’s not supposed to respond.

“Do you think it’ll look weird if we take it down in a week?” Ryan asks.

Jane levels a look at him. “Ryan, if you did end it next week, I don’t think that would count as uncomplicating it.”

Kesler avoids answering by looking back down at Jane’s phone and refreshing his Facebook page. Ben has added the comment “Homewrecker!!! :(“

“Ben isn’t actually gonna come after me, is he?” Kesler asks Jane, pointing out the comment.

Jane takes her phone back. “I’ll keep him in line. Ryan —”

“Are you gonna help me with geology or what?”

“Fine.” Jane narrows her eyes at him. “But only because I’m proud of you. And because I have an idea of what’s coming for you at the meeting.”

He’s early to the lecture, so he grabs a seat in the usual row and pretends to flip through his textbook.

It’s not a surprise when Ladd sits down next to him, but when he tears off a piece of Ryan’s bagel, it’s so benign and coupley that Ryan just stares at him for a minute.

“What?” Ladd asks as he chews.

“Nothing,” Ryan says.

Ladd grins, like Ryan said something funny. “Oh hey, you actually finished the assignment?”

“Yeah, Jane helped me,” Ryan says, pushing it in Ladd’s direction.

“How’d you land a smart chick?” Jared asks, leaning over Ladd.

“I didn’t ‘land’ her,” Ryan says, rolling his eyes. He pretends not to notice Ladd’s little grin. “And crazy things happen when you hang out with people who don’t play sports or pick you up at parties.”

He throws insults back and forth with Jared while Ladd finishes copying his answers. Jared reaches for it when Ladd slides it back, but Ryan snatches it away.

“Do your own homework, dickwad,” he says.

“What, you’ll let Laddy copy, but not me?” Jared whines.

“Yes,” Ryan says firmly, pretending that Ladd isn’t grinning like a loon next to him.

“Oh, so that’s how it’s gonna be now?” Jared says dramatically.

“Shut up, Jared,” Ladd says. “You can’t come between our love.”

The professor calls for attention then, and they all turn to the front. Ryan is paying way more attention than usual, hoping that he isn’t actually blushing. Ladd kicks his ankle gently and flashes him a quick smile when he looks over. It shouldn’t make him feel better, but it does.

–

He’s really nervous as they walk into the GSA meeting room. It’s stupid, but his palms are kind of sweaty, and his heart is racing a little, and he just — he doesn’t know why, he doesn’t know what to expect. Jane said she did, and that actually scares him a little, but she’s going to be there. Ladd’s by his side, and the second the door shuts behind him, he takes Ryan’s hand.

“Holy shit,” someone says from across the room.

“Andy, baby, don’t tell me it’s true!” one of the juniors says.

“Interloper!” Ben shouts.

Ryan just works on not letting it affect him, like the taunts of an opposing team’s fans as you walk into the tunnel, but Ladd’s ducking his head and grinning as he tugs Ryan to a pair of open chairs.

Ryan sits down first, but before Ladd can sit next to him, Jane drops into the seat and grins at them both. Without missing a beat, Ladd drops onto Ryan’s lap.

Someone in the room whistles, and Ryan is suddenly very glad Ladd is there, because he can hide the fact that he’s blushing by pressing his face into Ladd’s back.

Jane flicks him in the shoulder and smiles at him when he looks over. Ryan smiles back and tries to loosen his grip on Ladd’s waist. It’s safe here, that’s the whole point.

Erin calls the meeting to order, and eventually everyone settles down and shuts up. Ladd rearranges himself in Ryan’s lap so they’re both comfortable and Ryan can actually see the rest of the room.

“Okay, so our first order of business tonight is next week’s —”

“Excuse me, point of order!” Jack calls out. “I think I first order of business should be fair jock distribution throughout the group.” He gets a few laughs. “I mean, come on, is it really fair for them to hog each other? Leave some jocks for the rest of us!”

Ryan doesn’t even know how to respond to that, but Ladd just puts both of his arms around around Ryan and glares at the room.

“No. My jock.”

“I’m my own jock, thank you,” Ryan mutters.

“Sure you are,” Ladd says, ducking down to kiss him quickly. Ryan can feel himself blushing when the room breaks out into a chorus of “ooooooohs”.

“As I was saying,” Erin tries again.

“What is this, the seventh grade? I want a real show!” Ben calls out. He’s apparently decided that if he can’t have Ladd, he’ll take up voyeurism.

“That’s what your porn collection is for, Benny,” Jane says.

“I like you best,” Ryan whispers once the room is finally under control of Erin. Ladd pouts and Jane gives him a smug look.

It’s kind of nice.

Ryan’s gotten used to speaking up in meetings, but he stays quiet tonight, just enjoying the unexpected pleasure of Ladd on his lap, and his hand stroking the back of Ryan’s neck every once in a while, usually when he catches one of the other guys looking their way.

For the first time, Ryan understands why someone might want to come out. It would be nice to have this all the time. Well, not all the time, because Ladd is actually kind of fucking heavy, but it’s good for now.

The meeting ends, but Ladd doesn’t move, he just turns a little so he’s almost straddling Ryan.

“I don’t think I actually want to give them a show,” Ryan says, but he doesn’t move away when Ladd leans down and rests his head against Ryan’s.

“But what if I want to make everyone jealous of me? This is the only place I get to to do it.”

“Jealous of me, you mean. I still think Ben might kill me in my sleep.”

“I wouldn’t let him. And no, I mean jealous of me. Do you know how many people asked me if you were single after your first meeting?”

Ryan never used to blush this much, he’s pretty sure. “Shut up, they did not.”

“They did. Didn’t they, Jane?”

Ryan had kind of forgotten she was there.

“Sorry, Ryan, they totally did.”

“I hate both of you,” Ryan informs them.

“No, you don’t,” Ladd says, and kisses him so Ryan can’t argue.

After the meeting, they’re almost back to the house when Ladd asks, “So do you have anything wild and crazy planned for Saturday?”

It feels like a trick question, like maybe he’s forgetting something. “No? I mean, I’m sure the guys will be doing something stupid.”

Ladd snorts in agreement. Friday night games always make for interesting Saturday nights. “Did you want to do keg stands with Smitty?” Ladd asks.

Ryan shrugs. “I can pass on getting kicked in the face again til next time, I guess. Why?”

“I was thinking we could grab dinner off campus, maybe see what movies are playing.” Ladd shrugs.

It’s kind of weird that Ladd wants to go on a date, but it doesn’t sound like a terrible time, and he’s going to have to eat at some point. He’d almost rather stay in and have sex, because a date is — it’s just weird. But he promised.

“Yeah, sure, I mean, whatever sounds good.”

“Cool,” Ladd says with a wide grin.

–

The game on Friday goes great. Their line gets two goals, and Coach mentions wanting to give them some power play time. Dinner after is loud and cheerful, and Ladd is handsy, but no one thinks anything of it.

“Meet me in the south lot at six tomorrow?” Ladd asks quietly when they go their separate ways at the house. Ryan nods, and Ladd brushes his fingers against Ryan’s waist where none of the guys can see.

At 5 the next day, Ryan realizes this is a terrible idea.

“This is a terrible idea,” he tells Jane on the phone.

“Can’t figure out what to wear?” Jane asks. Ryan is, in fact, standing in his room in a towel, hair dripping, and he has no idea what to wear.

“We’re just going to the movies or something, it doesn’t matter what I wear.” Ryan really wishes he sounded like he meant that.

“Wear the jeans that make your ass look good,” Jane instructs.

“Since when do you notice what my ass looks like?” Ryan asks, but he knows which jeans she means, so he pulls them out.

“I’m a lesbian, not blind. That dark blue button down. It brings out your eyes.”

“Isn’t that a little dressy?” Ryan asks, but he pulls it out anyway.

“Andrew will appreciate it. And I’d just like to point out the ridiculousness of a dyke giving a gay man fashion advice.”

“I’m a hockey player. My idea of fashion is making sure my jersey fits right.”

–

When he gets to the lot, Ladd is leaning against a RAV-4, and Ryan’s glad Jane made him dress up a little. Not that Ladd’s dressed up, he just looks really good. Ryan’s almost tempted to push him back against the car right there.

“Whose car is this?”

“Ben’s,” Ladd says. “He said we can borrow it.”

“Did you have to trade sexual favors?” Ryan asks. It’s weird when Ladd opens his door for him, but kind of nice.

“Nah, but I didn’t sweep the car for bugs, so I can’t guarantee full privacy in the back seat later. But I’m sure he’d keep it for his private collection.”

There’s nothing they can do in the back seat that they haven’t already, but Ryan can’t help the little thrill that goes through him at the thought.

Ryan expects Ladd to take them to the strip of Burlington with the multiplex and a bunch of restaurants, but instead he drives them a few towns over and parks in the lot of a bar and grill.

“Is this okay?” Ladd asks when he turns off the car. “I just figured, you know, there probably won’t be people from school here…”

“It’s fine,” Ryan assures him, and to cover up how awkward he feels, he leans across and kisses Ladd. Ladd opens up to him immediately, threading his fingers through Ryan’s carefully gelled hair. Ryan really wishes the center console wasn’t between them right now.

“Your ass looks amazing in those jeans,” Ladd says between kisses. Ryan laughs.

“That’s what Jane said.”

Ladd pulls back a little and narrows his eyes at Ryan. “Tell Jane to keep her eyes to herself.”

“Oh, shut up,” Ryan says, and he kisses Ladd again.

They kiss like that, leaning over the console, until Ladd pulls back. “No, wait. I have a plan for the evening, and you’re skipping things.”

“So?” Ryan asks, leaning in again.

“No,” Ladd says, leaning back against the door. “I’m taking you to dinner.”

“Well, if you insist,” Ryan says, hopefully with more lightness than he feels at the moment.

Ladd grins and opens his door. Ryan quickly gets out before Ladd has the chance to open the door for him.

The place is pretty much one step up from a diner, nothing too fancy, thank god, but Ryan notices the rainbow flag sticker on the door. Ladd really did plan this.

It’s dimly lit, and the menu is simple, but Ryan stares at it so he won’t have to look at Ladd. Now that they’re here, just by themselves, Ryan feels even more uncomfortable. They have to get through a whole meal before they can go to the movie, or better yet, start making out again.

But then Ladd starts talking about their upcoming game against BU, and plays he thinks he and Ryan can pull off against them, and if there’s one thing Ryan can always talk about, it’s hockey. He’s surprised when their burgers are set in front of them.

A few minutes later, Ladd’s phone beeps.

“It’s Seabs,” he says with a smile. “He wants to know how it’s going.” He starts tapping out a reply.

“Oh,” Ryan says, unsure of what to think of Ladd telling Seabs about their date. Maybe asking him for help in thinking of what to do. He’s not jealous, but it makes it feel more real and serious, that Ladd asked his best friend for advice. “What are you telling him?”

Ladd grins. “I’m telling him it’s going great, and if he knows what’s best for him, he won’t text me again tonight, because I’ll be busy.”

Ryan relaxes a little, like, he’s glad Ladd thinks the date is going well. Ryan just doesn’t have any frame of reference for this, because the only other date he’s been on was a group thing in the eighth grade when supposedly he was going with Sarah Larson, but they barely looked at each other the whole time.

Ladd insists on paying when the check comes. “I invited you.”

Ryan frowns. “I’m not the girl.”

“Believe me, I know,” Ladd says with a grin.

He buys the movie tickets, too, but Ryan steals Ladd’s wallet out of his hand so he has a chance at paying for the soda and popcorn.

“That was a dirty trick,” Ladd says in his ear as their drinks are filled. Ryan has to pretend he’s waiting for a face off to keep from shivering a little.

It’s a Saturday night, and they’re seeing some movie with lots of explosions, so the theater is pretty crowded. Which means no making out, even though they sit near the back.

When the lights go down, though, Ladd leans against Ryan’s shoulder and puts his hand on Ryan’s thigh. His hand is warm through Ryan’s jeans, and even though he’s not doing anything with his hand, Ryan can feel a low burn of want start in his stomach. He’s going to be a mess by the end of the movie. He really should move Ladd’s hand.

Instead, he covers Ladd’s hand with his own. After a few minutes, Ladd curls his fingers around Ryan’s.

It’s nice not worrying about anyone seeing them in the dark, but Ryan wishes there were fewer people around. Ladd should’ve chosen some kids’ movie. Maybe — no, no maybe, because there isn’t going to be a next time.

Besides, they’d probably get caught and arrested for lewd behavior, and wouldn’t that be a great way to get outed? He can see it on TSN: Vancouver Canucks prospect Ryan Kesler and Carolina Hurricanes prospect Andrew Ladd were arrested in Burlington, Vermont for lewd behavior in a movie theater.

And then getting released the very next day. That would happen.

“Hey, are you okay?” Ladd whispers.

“Huh? Yeah, fine,” Ryan says. “This movie is really dumb.”

“That’s half the point,” Ladd grins.

Ryan actually hadn’t been paying attention to the movie at all, and now that he tries, he finds he can’t follow what little plot it’s pretending to have between all the explosions.

Ladd squeezes his hand, and Ryan squeezes back without thinking about it.

After what seems like eternity but is only 97 minutes, according to the movie information out front, the movie is finally over.

Ryan stands up the second the credits start rolling, and he pulls Ladd to his feet, too.

“Whoa, are we in a hurry?” Ladd asks.

“Yes,” Ryan hisses. “Car. Now.”

Ryan’s not bold enough to drag Ladd through the lobby by his hand, but he wishes he was, because Ladd is just meandering along like he has nothing urgent to do, and Ryan clearly remembers saying “now.”

In the parking lot, there’s less of a crowd, and Ryan gets Ladd by his wrist. Ladd had the great foresight to park in the back corner of the lot, and when they get to the car, Ryan pushes Ladd against the door — kinda hard, oops — and attacks his mouth.

Ladd doesn’t seem too upset about it, though.

They kiss like that until Ryan’s grinding his hips down against Ladd’s, and Ladd pulls his head back to say, “Maybe, uh, maybe we should get in the car.”

“Yeah. Yes,” Ryan says, but he doesn’t move.

“I need to get the keys out, Kes.” Ladd laughs.

Ryan runs his hands over the front of Ladd’s jeans, searching for them, and Ladd gasps. “Oh fuck, thanks, but uh —” He reaches into his jacket pocket and fumbles with the buttons until the headlights flash.

Ryan doesn’t even bother with the front door, just reaches behind Ladd and pops open the back door.

“You know,” Ladd says, “I was gonna try and be classy about this…”

“Fuck classy,” Ryan growls. He crowds Ladd into the car, and onto the seat, and climbs on top of him. He turns and shuts the door without banging his head on the roof of the car, barely. Then he’s back on top of Ladd, kissing him and running his hands over his chest, and fuck, it’s good.

Not great, because the backseat is still not really big enough for two hockey player-sized guys, but Ryan doesn’t even care — Ladd is thrusting his hips against Ryan’s and saying “Ryan, fuck, want you so bad,” between kisses.

Ryan gets Ladd’s shirt up to his armpits, figures that’s good enough, then moves to his zipper. Ladd is trying to work on the buttons of Ryan’s shirt, and is being impeded by his unwillingness to move his mouth from Ryan’s.

Ryan seriously considers ripping them all off, but he doesn’t have that many nice shirts, and he’d have to explain to his mom how he ruined this one. Finally Ladd gets the last button undone, and he pulls Ryan down to him so their skin is touching.

Ryan’s hard-on is starting to be painful inside of his jeans, and he doesn’t think his knees will ever be the same from being squished in here, and he doesn’t care at all. Ladd’s hands move to Ryan’s fly and brush his dick, and Ryan can’t even be embarrassed at the sound he makes then. He has to stop kissing Ladd and pant into his neck as Ladd works the button open and the zipper down.

“God, Andrew, please,” he moans into Ladd’s skin. Ladd’s hips buck, and his dick brushes Ryan’s, and oh.

“Like that?” Ladd asks. Ryan can’t even make words anymore, he can only nod.

He fumbles to get Ladd’s pants down until finally, finally their dicks are touching, and they’re both smearing pre-come on each other’s stomachs as they thrust against each other. It’s fucking amazing, feeling Ladd’s dick sliding against his own, but he wants so much more.

But they’re in the back seat of Ben’s car — he’ll probably be embarrassed about that later, but right now he doesn’t give a shit — and there’s just no room, not to mention lube or condoms, so he has to make do. So he wraps his hand around both of their cocks and has to bite the inside of his lip when Ladd moans, “Oh fuck yes.”

“You are so fucking hot,” Ryan mumbles against his ear. “I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, because you already know, but oh fuck —” he bites out as Ladd grabs his wrist and makes him twist his hand around them both.

“Ryan,” Ladd whines, and that’s it, Ryan is done, he’s coming all over Ladd’s stomach and his own stomach, and probably Ben’s backseat, too.

He’s barely even done when Ladd says “Oh, fuck,” and wraps his hand around Ryan’s for just a few strokes, and then he’s coming too. Ryan feels it on his dick and his stomach, and if he could get hard again this soon, he would, just from that.

Ryan collapses onto Ladd’s chest, tucks his face between Ladd’s neck and shoulder, and breathes in the mingled scent of sweat and come and Ladd’s cologne. Ladd settles his arms around Ryan’s waist, and they just stay there like that. In a few minutes, it’s probably gonna be seriously gross, but until then, Ryan can’t be assed to move.

Eventually it’s too itchy to lay comfortably, so they have to move. They clean up as best they can with napkins from Ben’s glove compartment. There is totally jizz on the bottom of Ryan’s shirt. Hopefully it will be too dark on the walk back to the house for anyone to notice.

On the way back, Ladd drives with one hand and rests the other on Ryan’s thigh. Ryan thinks about telling him to drive with two hands: what, does he wanna get them killed? But he’s too blissed out from his orgasm to care, and it feels good and warm, so he doesn’t say anything

They make out for a while in the parking lot back at school. It was just supposed to be a quick goodnight kiss that they can’t really have anywhere else, but they get distracted.

Finally they pull away, and Ladd smiles softly. Ryan can’t remember seeing him smile like that before. It makes him feel kind of weird as he tries to smile back.

“Tonight was good,” Ladd says.

“Yeah,” Ryan agrees. Because it was, it was really good.

They walk back to the house quietly, and it’s almost the perfect way to end the evening. Ryan can’t help wishing they were going to bed together.

The party has moved elsewhere when they get to the house, so they don’t have to explain where they’ve been or what, exactly, is on Ryan’s shirt.

“See you tomorrow,” Ladd says softly at the bottom of the stairs, even though there’s no one around to hear him.

“Yeah,” Ryan says. He reaches out and brushes the back of Ladd’s neck with his hand. It’s a pretty stupid gesture, but Ladd smiles like Kesler gave him a winning lottery ticket.

–

Ryan wakes up the next morning to Tim’s snoring, but not even that can dampen the overwhelming feeling of contentment. It’s pretty strange — Ryan’s mostly used to an overwhelming feeling of anger — but he can roll with it.

He brushes his teeth, throws on shorts and a hoodie, and goes downstairs to see if he has any cereal left.

No one actually does much cooking at the house — they all have pretty big meal plans — but almost everyone keeps snacks around. Ryan hasn’t done any grocery shopping in a while, but he finds a box of Frosted Mini Wheats that’s not too stale. He’ll head to the dining hall later, when he feels like getting dressed.

He eats them straight from the box and wanders into the den, where anyone who’s already up will have gathered.

“Seriously, Laddy, you should meet her. Tits out to here,” Jared says. “And she’s not obviously crazy or anything.”

“Wow, what a stunning recommendation,” Ladd says lazily from his chair. “Hey, Kes,” he says when he sees Ryan hanging around the doorway.

“Seriously, though,” Chris cuts in. “She’s hot, and she asked where you were last night.”

Ryan can feel the good mood he woke up with slipping away, even as Ladd rolls his eyes. “Thanks, guys, but I can pick up on my own. I don’t need an assist on this.”

Ryan doubts anyone else notices the lack of pronoun used.

“He just doesn’t get it,” Jared says.

“Not at all,” Chris agrees. “You’ll see, Ladder. And then you’ll be thanking us.”

“I really won’t,” Ladd says, then turns to Ryan.

“Kes. Share the cereal love.” He makes a sleepy motion with his hand. Ryan walks into the room and hands him the cereal box, even though he wants to say, “No cereal until you tell them you’re taken.” Ladd’s rumpled from sleep and sprawled in the chair almost bonelessly. Ryan is torn between wanting to kiss him and wanting to punch him. So pretty much like normal then, but he’d gotten used to the kissing feeling winning out.

“Keep it,” he says, when Ladd tries to hand the box back. “I think I’m just gonna go to the dining hall.” He scrams as quickly as possible without looking like he’s running away. He changes into jeans and sneakers as fast as he can, and when he gets down the stairs, Ladd is dressed and waiting and smiling, like he’s wondering what took Ryan so long.

Kesler tries to push the nagging horrible feeling away as he eats breakfast with Ladd. The guys on the team are morons, pretty uniformly, and they don’t know any better. Ladd said no, and he isn’t pretending to be interested in another girl or anything. It doesn’t matter anyway.

Ladd kicks his feet under the table and asks what’s bothering him. Ryan snaps, “I’m not awake yet, dumbass, oh my god, shut up,” and Ladd laughs, then goes and refills Ryan’s coffee.

Ryan is fine. And everything is going to be fine. He shoves some hash browns in his mouth and tries to believe that.

–

They have practice that afternoon, and then it’s time to do all the homework they’ve neglected the rest of the weekend. Ladd and Ryan agree to do it separately so it actually gets done.

When they get back from dinner, there are a bunch of girls in the den.

Ryan feels awkward almost immediately. He’s never been good at faking interest in these situations, so he usually just defaults to acting like an asshole or bailing entirely. But Ladd lets Jared wave him over to the couch.

“Ladd! Come meet Brittany.”

And Ryan should leave, he should just go to his room and fucking….do anything but stand here and watch this all go down. He knows how it’s going to end, there’s no need for him to torture himself.

He sits down in one of the chairs that’s supposed to be in the kitchen and pretends to watch NHL On the Fly instead of the Animal Planet or whatever the hell is happening on the couch.

But of course he can’t help watching. Like a car accident or something, he just can’t look away.
Ladd’s standing by the couch smiling and saying hi to everyone. Ryan vaguely recognizes the girls because they hang around the hockey players a lot — Jane lectured him last time he used the phrase “puck bunnies.”

He knows who Brittany is, despite missing the introductions. She has shiny hair and a low cut shirt, and she really does have tits out to there. And she’s leaning toward Ladd, flashing her incredibly white teeth. Ryan makes himself look back at the TV when she pulls Ladd down onto the couch next to her.

He manages to concentrate on hockey for a few minutes while they’re showing Canucks highlights. When he looks back at the couch, Brittany is leaning against Ladd, her tits pressed up against his arm, and Ladd is laughing.

Ryan gets up so fast he knocks his chair over. He rights it quickly, not looking at anyone, trying to hide his blush. He flees to his room and slams the door behind him.

He puts on his headphones and pulls up hockeyfights.com on his laptop. He gets through every Probert fight there is before someone knocks on his door. He ignores it, hoping whoever it is will just leave him alone, but after a minute, there’s another knock, and Ladd pokes his head in.

“Hey, how loud do you have those things?” he asks, nodding to Ryan’s headphones.

“Not very,” Ryan says, barely looking up.

“Oh.” Ladd sounds confused. “Everything okay? Did something happen?”

“Nothing happened. Nothing unexpected, anyway,” Ryan says, still staring at the screen.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Ladd asks, dropping onto the foot of Ryan’s bed.

“It isn’t supposed to mean anything,” Ryan says. “It just is what it is.”

“Wait,” Ladd says, “are you mad at me?”

“Why would I be mad at you?” Ryan asks tonelessly.

“You are! What the hell, dude?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ryan says. He pulls up Gordie Howe’s page and starts at the beginning.

“Ryan, will you at least look at me?” Ladd puts his hand on Ryan’s shoulder, and Ryan jerks away. “Okay, seriously, what is going on?”

“Isn’t there like, a party downstairs that you should be a part of?” Ryan very carefully looks at Ladd’s shoulder.

“Is that what this is about? Are you mad about Brittany? I didn’t want them to set me up, you heard me tell them. And nothing happened down there, and nothing is going to happen, okay?”

Ryan feels some sort of weird calm descend. “Maybe it should, though,” he says, and it barely even feels like him talking. “This will be over on Tuesday, and then you might want her around.”

Ladd kind of looks like someone hit him with a brick. “But…” he says. “I mean, I thought…”

“You thought what?”

“I thought you liked this, liked us,” Ladd nearly yells.

“Keep your voice down,” Ryan lectures. “And of course I like it, who doesn’t like getting laid regularly? But it’s just a fling, Ladd. Half the appeal is the expiration date.”

He wonders how he manages to sound so calm and detached.

“What — what is wrong with you?” Ladd asks, his voice straining.

“With me? Nothing. This whole thing was your idea, in case you forgot.”

“Only because you were being insane and I thought…”

“That one week would make me fall madly in love with you?” Ryan asks. “You certainly aren’t lacking in confidence, are you?”

“I thought if I could get you to get over yourself for a second, you’d realize that we’re good together, and I’m serious about this,” Ladd growls.

The familiar thrum of anger at Ladd is almost comforting. “We’re not,” Ryan says flatly. “And you’re not.”

“What is it gonna take for you to believe me? You’re so busy being a fucking martyr that you’re not paying attention!”

Ryan narrows his eyes. “Sorry you didn’t get your way this time. That must be tough for you. Maybe Brittany can help you through it. Now I have homework to finish up. You can leave.”

“No,” Ladd says.

“Excuse me?” Ryan asks.

“I’m not leaving,” Ladd says, crossing his arms. Ryan hasn’t balled up his fist with the urge to punch him in so long, it’s almost comforting. “You agreed to date me til Tuesday.”

“I’m breaking up with you early,” Ryan snaps.

“Then the deal’s off. I’m not leaving you alone,” Ladd says.

“Fuck you motherfucking fuck cock son of a bitch,” Ryan swears. “Fine, whatever, Tuesday.”

“And you can’t be mysteriously unavailable until Tuesday night,” Ladd sneers.

“What the fuck do you care?” Ryan finally explodes.

“It clearly doesn’t matter to you,” Ladd says. He crosses his arms over his chest and glares. “But that’s the deal. Unless you stick with your end, I’m not sticking with mine.”

“Fucking fine!” Ryan says. “But unless you get out right the fuck now, you’re gonna have to tell everyone you walked into a door.”

Ladd walks to the door. “I’m leaving. But tomorrow morning —”

“Yes, I get it,” Ryan interrupts him. “Leave.”

Ladd slams the door behind him.

–

Ryan stews all night, and as he falls asleep, is reminded of that cliché “never go to bed angry.” Like it fucking matters. He just has to get through two more days of this, and it’s not like they have a real relationship or anything.

When he gets downstairs the next morning, two minutes before he has to leave for class, Ladd is waiting for him with an Eggo and a travel mug of coffee.

“What are you doing?” Ryan asks, eyeing the waffle suspiciously. He’d taken the coffee without thinking about it, and now nearly regrets it.

“Holding up my end of the deal,” Ladd says. “Come on, we’re gonna be late for class.”

Ryan doesn’t know how he just does that, how he can pretend last night didn’t even happen. But if there’s one thing he’s pretty sure of, it’s Andrew Ladd’s ability to fake things, so it’s not as surprising as it could be.

Ladd sits next to him in class and bumps his knee against Ryan’s periodically. Ryan has to stop himself from pulling away. He just has to remind himself that he deals with this now, and come Tuesday, Ladd will leave him alone for good.

“I’m having lunch with Jane,” Ryan says pointedly when class is over.

“I know,” Ladd says. “I’ll see you at practice, eh?”

“Yeah okay,” Ryan says, and he hurries off to meet Jane at the Student Union.

“Sooo,” Jane says when she sits down, “how was the rest of your weekend?”

Ryan drops his head onto the table.

He explains what happened in as few words as possible in between sips of his Gatorade.

“You’re a fucking moron,” Jane says when he finishes.

“Why, because I don’t want to watch a straight guy set up a back up plan for when he gets tired of experimenting?”

“Ryan, he’s not —”

“Not what? Straight?” Ryan scoffs. “He spent the first semester actively trying to piss me off in any way he could, and suddenly he’s decided I’m worth redefining his sexuality for? He’s had five months and plenty of willing guys in the GSA.”

“I know, but…”

He flicks the cap from his bottle across the table. “Just because I’m not picking out curtains with Andrew fucking Ladd doesn’t mean I’m going to die alone, Jane.”

“Where are you gonna find a gay guy that puts up with all your hockey shit?” Jane asks.

“I’ll marry a Canadian,” Ryan says promptly, and Jane finally laughs.

“You really don’t think you could give Andrew the benefit of the doubt? I mean, he’s been a good boyfriend for the most part, hasn’t he?”

Ryan sighs. “I mean, yeah, sure, this week, he has. But I can’t trust that he’ll be there when it gets tough. Isn’t that important?”

“Of course, but —”

“Jane, I really don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“Okay. Do you still need help on that World Lit paper?”

–

Ryan’s supposed to meet a bunch of the guys in the weight room after class, but Ladd’s going to be there, so he’s already decided to skip and maybe just go hit the bike in the regular student gym. But when he gets out of class, Ladd is there waiting for him.

“Don’t you ever have anything better to do?” Ryan asks.

“I want to hang out with you, it sort of goes along with —”

“Fine, whatever,” Ryan says, cutting him off before he can say ‘dating’ or whatever he was going to.

“Besides, we’re going to the same place.” Ladd shrugs, and Ryan has to pretend he wasn’t thinking about bailing.

Ladd carries on a one sided conversation the whole trip across campus, and Ryan mostly tunes him out once he figures out that Ladd doesn’t actually expect him to respond. He just needs to get through a few more hours of this shit, and Ladd will finally, finally leave him alone.

He’s still glad when they meet up with the other guys, and he can talk to other people, and it’s totally acceptable when he just puts on his iPod and hops on the bike. But he swears he can feel Ladd watching him the entire time, like maybe he’s getting turned on watch Ryan sweat.

Probably not, though, because that’s treading a little to close into actual homosexuality for Ladd.

When Ryan’s done on the bike, he goes to pee before starting with the weights. He’s kept his headphones in, so he’s taken by complete surprise when he’s walking back to the weight room and Ladd ambushes him.

Ladd pulls him behind a row of lockers and pushes him up against them and kisses him hard. Ryan opens his mouth and lets him in without even thinking about it, then regrets it.

“We shouldn’t —” he manages before Ladd bites his neck.

“No one’s coming. No one will see. I checked,” Ladd says. He’s breathing heavily, and Ryan can’t tell if it’s from his workout, making out, or both. Ladd smells like sweat. Ryan’s sure he does too. It should be gross, but instead Ryan is hard in his shorts, and his hips are starting to buck against Ladd’s.

“Every time we’re here together, I wanna drag you back here and blow you,” Ladd says. Ryan can’t even process that because then Ladd is dropping to his knees and pulling Ryan’s shorts down.

It takes him an embarrassingly short time to come. Ladd gets up and kisses him after, and when Ryan offers his hand he shakes his head. “I’m good.”

Ryan wonders how the hell he’s supposed to work out now. Ladd has moved away and grabbed his water bottle — he apparently jumped Kesler totally prepared. He takes a few sips and hands the bottle to Ryan, who drinks about half of it in one go.

“Come on,” Ladd says. “I’ll spot you.”

Ryan doesn’t even know what to say to that, and his brain still feels fogged and stupid from his orgasm, so he just follows Ladd back to the weight room and doesn’t even consider letting a weight drop on his head.

The rest of the guys clear out before they do, for night class, for dinner, whatever. Eventually it’s just him and Ladd, and they hit the showers together. Ladd doesn’t say much, which works fine for Ryan, as they rinse off to the sound of the water echoing off the walls.

He glances over his shoulder, checking again that they’re the only ones here, before shoving Ladd back against the tiles.

“Kes, what —” Ladd asks as Ryan wraps a hand around his dick.

“I owe you one,” Ryan says, stroking Ladd as fast as he can.

“Oh, fuck,” Ladd swears, letting his head fall back against the wall. The handjob is fast and frantic. Ryan loses the rhythm a few times when he keeps checking to make sure no one’s walked in.

Ladd does a pretty good job of keeping quiet, which is almost a shame, but Ryan can appreciate the way he bites his lip and breathes heavily out his nose. The moan when he comes bounces off the wall, and it’s like every fantasy Ryan’s ever had of a locker room shower since he was fourteen come to life.

He rinses off his hand under the spray of water and grabs the shampoo while Ladd catches his breath.

Ryan finishes his shower first and cuts off the water without waiting for Ladd.

Ladd’s not too far behind him, though, and he’s ready by the time Ryan is, so they walk to dinner together in silence.

A few of the guys are still in the dining hall when they get there. They eat dinner and shoot the shit with the guys, and then Ryan announces his need to work on a paper and bails. Ladd, thankfully, doesn’t follow him.

–

He falls asleep feeling uneasy and doesn’t sleep well. When his alarm goes off, he slams it off, intending to stay in bed. Then he remembers his World Lit paper is due and groans. He stumbles out of bed and into some clothes.

After GSA today, Ladd will finally leave him alone for good, he remembers when he’s putting his paper in his backpack. It doesn’t fill him with the relief he thought it would. Whatever, he’s exhausted. He doesn’t have the energy for deep emotions right now.

After World Lit, he forgoes coffee completely and buys a big Red Bull on his way to practice.

He feels slightly more awake while he’s suiting up, but still off. Ladd’s next to him at his stall, joking with the guys. Jesus, Ryan can’t wait to just play some fucking hockey.

Practice is good. He doesn’t think about Ladd, except when he has to pass the puck to him, and he’s right there, waiting for it where Ryan’s dished it to. The time passes quickly, and they skip any post practice deviations to head to GSA.

It’s — it’s fucking weird. Ryan’s kind of looking forward to it, even though he’s ‘breaking up’ with Ladd almost immediately after the meeting. If ending this weird week even counts as a break up. But it’s not like he’s had a lot of opportunities to be out with another guy in public even a little before, so he lets Ladd take his hand when they walk into the room and doesn’t even object when Ladd pulls him down onto his lap, instead of letting him take the free seat next to him.

People pay them a whole hell of a lot less attention than they did the last time. Well, mostly.

“Jesus, Andy, haven’t you ever heard of Febreze? My entire car smelled like jizz,” Ben says loudly, even though he’s only sitting a few seats over from them.

Everyone laughs, and again when Jane says, “Oh, Ben, don’t even pretend like that isn’t why you lent him the car in the first place.”

She gives Ryan and Ladd a look, and Ryan shrugs just a little as Ladd tightens his arm around Ryan’s waist for just a moment. Jane rolls her eyes and goes back to talking to Lucy until Erin calls everyone to order.

Ryan lets his mind blank during the meeting. He pays not a bit of attention to the business or gossip going around. He doesn’t think about what will happen after the meeting, when he’ll go back to the house, and he won’t be dating Ladd anymore. He just sits on Ladd’s lap and concentrates on the feeling of Ladd brushing his thumb over Ryan’s hip, right above his jeans. He lets his fingers rest on the back of Ladd’s neck and scratch it lightly. He enjoys the lack of negative attention their displays garner.

Toward the end of the meeting, he starts paying attention again and realizes that Jane keeps shooting him these really worried looks. And she keeps shooting some other kind of look at Ladd, but Ryan can’t see the look Ladd’s giving her back, so he has no idea what it means. He makes a note to avoid Jane when the meeting is done.

When the meeting is over and everyone is just standing around talking, Ryan waits until Lucy is distracting Jane, then drags Ladd by the hand out of the room. He drops Ladd’s hand in the hallway and starts walking back to the house. Ladd walks besides him, a good two feet between them.

When they’re within sight of the house, Ryan turns to Ladd. “Okay.”

“Give me til the end of the night,” Ladd says immediately.

“No. That wasn’t part of the deal. A week, Ladd.”

Ladd steps into his space. It’s dark and no one can see them, but Ryan’s heartbeat picks up. “Ryan,” Ladd says, “Just give me to the end of the night. I want you to fuck me.”

Ladd says it very matter-of-factly, not in a sexy way at all, but all of Ryan’s blood rushes to his dick.

“I —” Ryan says.

“Come on, Ryan,” Ladd says, stepping even closer, so their chests are touching. And fuck it, Ryan’s only human.

“Okay,” he says.

“My room,” Ladd says, and he walks off to the house without waiting for Ryan.

Ryan just stares after him for a minute, maybe checking out his ass climbing the stairs, before following him. He doesn’t know how Ladd knows Jonesy won’t be coming back to the room any time soon, or if Ladd expects Ryan to spend the night, or what.

When he gets to the room, Ladd’s already got his shirt off, and Ryan quickly locks the door behind him. “You don’t have to do this, you know,” Ryan says. He doesn’t want Ladd to do this just to prove something to Ryan. That’s a fucking stupid reason to do it and won’t change anything.

“Fuck you,” Ladd says easily, “I want to. I want your cock in my ass, I want you inside me.”

Christ, that’s just not fair. Ladd starts on his belt, and he looks like something out of a soft core porno, all built and clean-shaven and undressing himself. But Ryan steps towards him and catches his hand. He doesn’t want to just watch. So he kisses Ladd and undoes his belt after rubbing his crotch through his jeans a few times.

Ladd just practically melts into Ryan when he kisses him. He’s warm and heavy, and Ryan is almost the only thing keeping him upright as he unzips his fly.

“Mmm, yeah, Ryan,” Ladd says, and his voice is already rough. Ryan nudges him back toward his bed.

“Come on,” he says. “Sit down before I drop you.”

“You won’t drop me,” Ladd says, but he sits on the bed anyway and toes off his sneakers.

“I might,” Kesler says, but he doesn’t mean it, and he’s already grabbing Ladd’s waistband and pulling down his jeans. The second they hit the floor, Ladd grabs Ryan, pulls him close, and kisses him, rough and sloppy.

“Too many clothes,” Ladd says after a few minutes. “Off.”

“Pushy,” Ryan says, but pulls his shirt off and starts on his jeans, which feels fantastic because his dick is so hard right now. When he’s down to his boxers, he pushes Ladd down onto the bed and climbs on top of him. He bites his way up Ladd’s chest, listening to the choked-off sounds Ladd makes and trying to make them happen again. He spends some time on Ladd’s nipples while he’s there, licking and sucking and biting softly. Ladd is covering his mouth with his forearm now, trying to cover his moans. His hips are moving restlessly under Ryan’s. Shit. At this rate neither of them are gonna last long enough to fuck.

He moves back up to Ladd’s mouth, trying to slow it down a little. Ladd seems perfectly content to kiss him, but he’s not getting any less desperate. He wraps his arms around Ryan and holds them so they’re pressed together from mouth to toes, with no space in between. He’s kissing Ryan so deeply it feels a little like he’s sucking out Ryan’s soul.

And fuck, but it’s hot.

After a few minutes of that, Ryan realizes that Ladd is whining a little in the back of his throat. He pulls away slightly.

“Want you in me now, Ryan, God, please,” Ladd babbles.

“Yeah, yeah, okay,” Ryan says, because what else can you say to that? “You have —”

“Desk drawer.” Ladd points. Ryan sits up and pauses a second to look at Ladd. His lips are red and swollen, his cheeks red with stubble burn, his hair is standing on end, there’s a bruise flowering on his collarbone, and his boxers are tented with a dark patch of pre-come.

Shit, Ryan has to press down on his dick and think of really unsexy things for a minute. He turns to the desk, hoping for bit of control.

There’s lube and condoms in the top drawer. Ryan grabs a condom and the bottle, which has clearly been opened before. He wonders if Ladd used it on himself. If he stuck his fingers in his ass while he was jerking off, trying to figure out if he liked it. Or maybe if he bought it after Ryan fingered him. Christ, this isn’t helping him regain control.

He takes a deep breath and turns back to Ladd. Ladd has shed his boxers, and he’s looking at Ryan like … Ryan doesn’t even know what. Like affection and determination and something else that Ryan can’t describe because only his lower brain is working right now. Ladd is rubbing his dick, not like he’s trying to get off, but like he can’t help it, and Ryan is done thinking for the moment.

He bats Ladd’s hand away and replaces it with his own. Ladd’s back arches, and his hips thrust, and he moans, “Fuck,” all drawn out, and then Ryan stops because Ladd can’t come yet. Ladd lays there panting while Ryan lubes up his fingers, and he says “Fuck yeah,” when Ryan circles his asshole and pushes two in at a time. He should probably be more careful, but he really can’t be, and Ladd isn’t complaining — he’s thrusting down like he wants more right now.

Ryan’s only done this once, but he remembers what it was like to be fucked for the first time. It wasn’t all that great, and it hurt a lot, so he really tries to concentrate on stretching Ladd. He presses his fingers apart, and he pours more lube on, and he adds a third. Ladd is panting and cursing and his hands are gripping his sheets, and he’s practically begging, “come on Ryan, put your dick in me, god, fuck, Ryan please.”

“Fuck, yeah, okay,” Ryan says finally. He pushes his boxers off, and takes out the condom, and if his hands are shaking a little, it’s probably because he’s been so goddamn turned on for what feels like forever.

When he’s lubed up and starting to push at Ladd’s entrance, he glances up, and Ladd is just looking at him. He doesn’t even look scared or nervous or anything, and Ryan has to kiss him.

“Now, Ryan,” Ladd says into his mouth, and god. Ryan pushes in, probably a little faster than he meant to, but Ladd is relaxed. He just takes it with this low moan that makes Ryan want to hold him down and fuck him so hard. But he stops when he’s all the way inside to let Ladd adjust, until Ladd starts bucking his hips a little and saying, “Fuck me, Ryan.”

And that’s one order from Ladd Ryan has no problem following. He tries to take it easy a little bit, but Ladd is having none of that, so Ryan fucks him hard, and reaches between them to jerk Ladd off, because there is no way he’s going to last a long time.

He’s watching Ladd’s face when he tenses and comes all over Ryan’s hand. Objectively, it’s a really dumb orgasm face, but at the moment it’s the hottest thing Ryan can think of, and his hips stutter as he thrusts twice, three more times and comes.

He doesn’t bother trying to keep himself off of Ladd when his arms can no longer support him. He just lays heavily on top of him, sweaty and sticky and not really giving a damn.

Ladd’s hand comes around to rest on his back, but Ryan still has to pull out, which he does as gently as possible - he knows it feels weird - and ties it off before tossing it in the trash can.

He lays down next to Ladd then, knowing he should get up and leave. This is finally over, and he’s sure he’ll be glad about it once his brain is back online. But Ladd rolls over into his space and throws an arm across his chest. Ryan considers just shoving it off, but it’s hard to be that much of a dick after sex.

He ends up dozing off, he doesn’t know for how long. He rouses briefly when he feels Ladd move off of him.

“Go back to sleep,” Ladd says softly. “I’m just telling Jonesy not to come back. I’ll set the alarm, okay?”

“Mmm,” Ryan grunts, and he turns over without really waking up. He feels Ladd settle in front of him, wraps his arm around him, and falls into a much deeper sleep.

–

He wakes up when the sun is just starting to rise and the room is filled with gray light. He’s confused at first. The light is coming in at the wrong angle, and there’s a warmth against his back and across his chest.

He’s in Ladd’s room, he remembers, as his brain wakes up a little more. And that’s Ladd spooned up against his back, his face tucked against the back of Ryan’s neck, breathing deeply.

Shit, he thinks.

It’s over. This is done, and he can leave. He carefully removes Ladd’s arm from around him. He doesn’t want to disturb him. Not that he cares how much sleep Ladd gets, but if he wakes up, he’ll probably make some big thing out of Ryan leaving, and he doesn’t want to deal with that before 7 AM.

He moves slowly and quietly, gathering his clothes from the floor and redressing. He smells like sex, the whole room does, so instead of going straight back to his room, he hits the shower.

If anyone else is up this early, they’ll think it’s weird he’s up and showered already, but at least he wasn’t caught smelling like that coming out of Ladd’s room. Fuck, they were so fucking stupid.

He gets more and more pissed at himself the more he thinks about it, until he’s too riled up to sleep. He grabs a change of clothes from his room and his backpack. He’s probably got some homework that needs doing.

On his way to the library, he changes his mind and heads to the weight room at The Gut. They have practice later, but Ryan hops on the treadmill and runs until his legs feel like jelly.

He showers, again, and the dining halls are open now, so he goes to get breakfast at the dining hall near the rink instead of going back to the house.

His phone rings while he’s eating. It’s Jane, but Ryan dismisses the call. There are no other missed calls or texts. Ryan wonders if Ladd is even awake yet. His first class starts in 15 minutes. Not that Ryan cares or anything.

When he can’t stretch out breakfast anymore, he goes to the library. He has class now, but he doesn’t feel like dealing with people, and it’s a big lecture anyway.

He grabs a study desk in the corner, turns his phone on silent, and pulls out his books.

He wakes up when someone hits him on the back of his head, and he has to peel his face from his backpack to glare at them.

“Fuck off,” he mumbles.

“You’ve got zipper marks on your face,” Jane says. “And your answer to number three is wrong.”

“No one asked you,” Ryan says, shoving his papers back into his French book.

“I’m helping you, you’re my friend. And as a friend, let me tell you, you look like shit.”

“I maybe overdid it working out this morning,” Ryan says, stealing her bottle of orange juice.

“You’ve got practice in an hour,” Jane says. “Why are you working out too much and skipping class?”

“Because I couldn’t sleep, and because I didn’t feel like going. How did you even find me?”

“That would be telling,” Jane says. “Maybe if you didn’t ignore my calls and texts, I wouldn’t have to come bug you in person.”

“My phone’s on silent,” Ryan says.

Jane gives him a thorough look over, and Ryan feels kind of uncomfortable. He must really look like shit, because she doesn’t even say anything else about it.

“We have time to get lunch before you have to go to practice,” she says finally. “And you owe me another orange juice.”

He ends up buying her entire lunch.

“You don’t have to walk me to practice, I’m not going to risk the wrath of Coach just because —” He cuts himself off.

“Because?”

“Because Ladd’s probably going to be acting all weird. It doesn’t matter, things are back to normal now,” he says.

“Sure,” Jane says. She doesn’t sound like she agrees with him, but she also manages not to sound entirely skeptical, which is nice.

They stop outside The Gut, and Ryan isn’t stalling when he says, “So I’ll see you at dinner?”

“For sure,” Jane says. He’s kind of surprised when she hugs him before shoving him inside.

Tim’s only a few steps behind him. “Hey dude, glad to see you’re not dead.”

“Huh?” Ryan asks.

“You don’t come home last night, you skip French this morning, the pot was split between ‘dead in a ditch’ and ‘with your lady friend.’”

He almost corrects Tim, but realizes there’s no reason to. Like, so what if Ladd’s pissed at him? “Well, I’m definitely not dead.”

Tim laughs and slaps him on the shoulder. “Way to go, Kes.”

Practice sucks.

Ryan is exhausted and out of it, so he’s slow and sloppy. Ladd is never there when Ryan tries to pass to him, and he’s skating gingerly, almost like he’s injured. It takes Ryan half of practice to realize that he’s probably sore as hell from last night. As soon as Ryan realizes that, he plays even worse.

Coach keeps him back after practice and doesn’t even yell at him. He looks concerned, which is worse.

“You don’t look well, Kesler.”

“I’m feeling a little under the weather,” Ryan says, and it’s not even a lie.

Coach pats him on the shoulder. “Get a good night’s sleep tonight, and a lot of rest. Let me know if you need a note for classes. I want you ready to go for Maine this weekend.”

“Sure thing, Coach,” Ryan says, and he trudges back to the locker room.

The locker room is loud and boisterous, as usual. Ryan sits at his spot and avoids looking over at Ladd. When he’s no longer drowning in gear, he pulls out his phone and texts Jane. Your dining hall for dinner? It’s farther away, but Ladd won’t be there.

“Texting your lady love?” Tim leers at him. Ryan doesn’t even get a chance to tell him to shut up, because Jonesy stands up and shouts,

“Hey, boys, Kes isn’t the only one who got laid last night! Ain’t that right, Laddy?”

The guys whoop and holler, and Ladd says, “Shut up, Jonesy.”

Jonesy doesn’t listen to him, though. “I had to spend the night on Jimmy’s floor, and there were condoms in the trash when I got back!”

Ryan concentrates on changing and tries as hard as he can not to blush.

“I told you you’d like Brittany!” Jared shouts.

“It wasn’t —” Ladd starts, but he’s hollered down by the guys.

Ryan shoves his feet into his shoes and grabs his bag. “Gotta go, see you boys later.” He’s out of the locker room before they’re even done replying.

Jane must still be worried, because she sits him down at a table and fixes him a plate of food. With extra mashed potatoes. She uses his meal card, of course, but that’s not important.

“I’m just tired,” Ryan insists, spooning the potatoes into his mouth.

“So you were up late last night?” Jane asks.

“Jane,” Ryan says.

“Ryan,” she echoes back. “You got a pass this morning, but I’m done waiting.”

“Nothing —” Jane snorts. “Fine. He asked me to fuck him, so I did.”

“And?” Jane asks. “Was it any good?”

“It was fine, it was sex,” Ryan says. “I fell asleep after, and then I left.”

“So let me get this straight. Out of the goodness of your heart, you decided to fuck Andrew even though you knew you were going to break up with him…”

“Oh Christ.”

“And then after you fucked him, you left while he was sleeping?”

Ryan glares. “If this is just going to be another ‘Ryan is a dick’ list, I could be sleeping right now.” He starts to get up but Jane reaches out and grabs his arm.

“Wait, I’m sorry. I’m just trying to figure it all out so I can help you. Sit down.”

Ryan sighs and sits. “I don’t need help, okay? It’s over. It’s done.”

“But you really do look awful. I’m telling you I’m worried about you, Ryan.”

“Seriously,” Kesler says. “I’m tired. I didn’t sleep well the night before last, and then last night I fell asleep in Ladd’s room, and I woke up really early, and I couldn’t stay because if people saw me leaving his room, that would pretty much be that. And I couldn’t fall back asleep, so I went to work out, and I had practice today too, and it sucked, and I really just want to go to sleep, all right?”

“All right,” Jane says. “Finish up and you can go to sleep.” And she doesn’t say anything else. Jesus, Ryan must really look awful.

He’s not really hungry, but he knows his body needs the fuel, so he eats. He listens to Jane talk about the cute girl in her Women’s Studies class and how she can’t tell if the girl is queer or not.

She walks him back to the house, gives him a hug, and ruffles his hair. “Sleep well. It’ll be better tomorrow.”

“Okay,” Ryan says, and he goes to his room, avoiding everyone in the house. It’ll be better tomorrow, he tells himself as he gets into bed.

–

It’s not better the next day.

He actually goes to class, so that’s an automatic downgrade. Practice is a little better, if only because his legs don’t feel like they’re going to fall off, but the passes aren’t any cleaner, and he and Ladd aren’t clicking.

He must look better, because Coach actually yells at them before they head to the showers.

Ryan’s halfway back to the house before he remembers the GSA meeting. He stands in the middle of the quad getting buffeted by the wind, debating whether or not to go, but fuck it. Andrew Ladd isn’t going to keep Ryan from going to a club made for guys like him, not guys like Ladd.

He’s a few minutes late, but Jane saved him a seat. He loves Jane. He wishes he could date Jane, and that either one of them would be into it.

“Hey, Ryan,” Devon, one of the sophomores, asks during a break. “Where’s Andrew?”

“I don’t know,” Ryan says. He doesn’t. He barely even noticed Ladd wasn’t there. Okay, he had noticed when he was trying to figure out where not to sit, but it didn’t matter, and he doesn’t care.

“Come on, really?” Devon asks. “I’m supposed to interview him for the paper.”

“So call him.” Ryan shrugs. “The team didn’t outfit us with GPS or anything like that.”

“Yeah, but —” Devon says, and Ryan really doesn’t want to hear it.

“Do you need his number?” he asks, and he pulls out his phone like he really thinks Devon needs Ladd’s number.

“No, I got it. It’s fine,” Devon says, and thankfully he stops bothering Ryan.

The thing is, he knows he could say, “We broke up, I don’t even want to know where he is,” and that would probably make his life easier. But then the entire GSA would want to know what happened, and they would all have opinions, and they’d want to share them all with Ryan. Ryan is so not up for that right now.

He sleeps only marginally better that night, and the whole house is awake at 5 AM the next day, stumbling around, making sure they have all their equipment so they can make the 6 AM bus call and go to Maine.

Ryan collapses into a seat next to Jared. Ladd is sitting across the aisle with Jonesy. He looks about as exhausted as Ryan feels. Not that Ryan cares or anything.

They lose pretty pathetically. The only consolation Ryan has is that he and Ladd weren’t the only ones who sucked. And they did suck.

After the game, he can feel Ladd’s eyes on him from across the locker room. He can’t help but look up to meet them, and he can see that Ladd feels as horrible as he does about the game. Then Ladd’s jaw clenches, and he looks away.

Well, good. Ryan doesn’t want Ladd staring at him.

No one is in a particularly good mood as they eat dinner, but that works for Ryan. He’s not really in the mood to pretend to care about Jonesy’s stupid jokes.

Conversation drifts around to the NHL, with everyone offering up the gossip about their favorite teams or teams they’ve been drafted to.

“Who’s got your rights now, Timmy?” Ryan teases. Poor kid has had his rights traded between four teams in the last two years.

“Hell if I know.” Tim shrugs. “Just so long as I don’t have to play with you assholes when I go pro.”

And oh, jeez, there’s a thought. But the odds of Ladd getting packaged up for Vancouver or Ryan being traded to Carolina are slim. Or so he tells himself.

And if they keep playing like they did today, no one’s going to think their history of playing together is a good reason to do it.

Of course, if Ryan keeps playing like he did tonight, the Canucks aren’t going to want his rights either.

He vows to himself right then and there that he’ll really start concentrating on hockey. He’s not here to date or join clubs or whatever else. He’s here to play hockey. Coach has already called an extra practice for Sunday, and that’s just fine with Ryan.

He goes back to the dorms they’re staying in, feeling slightly settled for the first time in weeks.

–

For almost a week, Ryan thinks of nothing but hockey and keeping his grades up so that he can keep playing hockey. He practices hard, he works out. He still eats meals with Jane, but he stops going to GSA meetings in favor of practicing his shot on the back lawn of the house.

Practices get a little better. He and Ladd never manage to play as well together as they did before last week, but they manage to not play as awfully as they did in Maine. Cam is getting closer to returning to the team, so they may not even be on a line together for much longer.

The weirdest thing that happens is that some of the other guys notice his renewed focus and decide to follow suit. Coach notices and raises his eyebrows at Ryan in practice, but otherwise says nothing.

On Thursday it rains. It’s barely above freezing, which makes the rain doubly uncomfortable. Not even Ryan and his renewed focus are going to be taking shots in the yard in that, so he and some of the guys have a brilliant idea to set up a net and some targets in the basement. This requires moving the beer pong table and the beer can sculpture, and somewhere in the middle of all that, someone shouts down the stairs, “Kes! You’ve got a visitor!”

He frowns before jogging up the stairs, trying to figure out if he forgot that he’d made plans with someone. He really hopes he didn’t forget something, because Jane’s standing near the front door soaking wet and looking miserable, and Jared’s standing awkwardly across from her, like he doesn’t know what to do with her.

“Hey, Ry,” she sighs.

“Hey, what’re you doing here?” he asks.

“I’ve been sexiled,” Jane says. “And I have all this reading I need to do, and it wasn’t sleeting like this when I left earlier, but I couldn’t get in to get my coat or an umbrella, and I tried to call you, but you didn’t answer, and I’m sorry for just showing up, but —”

“Hey, no, Janie, it’s fine,” Ryan says, approaching her with his hands out like he would a wounded predator. “You can hang out here tonight —”

“— I don’t know if they’ll be finishing up any time soon.”

“— you can spend the night, it’s cool. It’s cool, right, Jared?” Ryan asks.

“Uh, yeah, totally,” Jared says as he tries to slip away.

“And we’ve got a couple of washers and dryers. You can borrow some of my stuff, and we’ll throw yours in there,” Ryan suggests. The tension is bleeding out of Jane’s shoulders with every suggestion. “And maybe we’ll get you some coffee.”

At that, she flings her arms around him in a fierce, desperate hug. “Thanks.”

Ryan hugs back even though she’s freezing. “No problem, you’ve dealt with all of my shitty days.”

“I have,” she agrees, letting him go. Ryan laughs.

“Come on. You want a shower?”

“Oh god, yes.”

He gets her a clean towel, a pair of his shorts, and a Vermont Hockey hoodie, and shows her to the showers.

“These are the smallest things I have,” he says. Jane shrugs. “Throw your wet clothes out to me, and I’ll put them in the dryer and make you some coffee.”

Tim comes in while Jane is in the midst of throwing her wet clothing at Ryan from behind the shower curtain, one piece at a time.

“Dude,” he says.

“Don’t even,” Ryan warns.

“I can find another room to sleep in tonight, if you wanna, you know…”

Ryan wants to bang his head against the wall. From inside the shower, Jane starts cracking up.

“That’s really not necessary,” Ryan says.

“Okay,” Tim says. “Let me know if you change your mind.” He stands around awkwardly for a minute. “Dude, I gotta…”

“I know what peeing sounds like!” Jane shouts from the shower. Ryan laughs and raises his eyebrows at Tim before leaving with Jane’s clothes.

He takes out the clothes that have been in the dryer for 3 days running now and throws Jane’s in. Then he starts the coffee, washes a mug so she’ll have something to drink out of that isn’t disgusting, and gets out the sugar. There is no milk in the fridge that hasn’t been there a frighteningly long time, so she’ll just have to do without.

Jane comes downstairs when the coffee is almost done, looking completely ridiculous in Ryan’s way-too-large clothes and bare feet.

“Shut the fuck up,” she says when Ryan points this out to her. “Not my fault you’re a giant.”

“I am perfectly normal-sized,” Ryan informs her loftily, “for a hockey player.”

She smacks him on the shoulder and fixes her coffee.

A bunch of guys are in the den watching the Bruins on TV, and they clear out some space for Ryan and Jane. Jane brings her book and her highlighter and tucks her feet underneath Ryan’s thigh.

When Ladd gets back, Jane has finished her reading, and the Bruins are up by 1 with 6 minutes left Ryan and Cam are trying to explain the intricacies of hockey with expansive hand gestures, despite Jane’s constant fit of giggles.

Ryan fights to keep the smile from sliding off his face, but it must not work, because Jane turns around and says, “Hey Andrew.”

Ladd clears his throat. “Hey, Jane, didn’t think I’d be seeing you here.”

“Sexiled.” Jane shrugs. “So I’m imposing on Ryan.”

“Oh,” Ladd says. “You look good in the green and yellow.”

She snorts. “Butch, right?”

“Your clothes are probably dry, if you want to change back,” Ryan says, interrupting them.

“I’m probably going to have to wear them again tomorrow.” Jane shrugs. “So I’ll probably just sleep in these, if you don’t mind.”

“I’ve got like, eight of those, Janie, I can share.”

“Ugh, don’t call me that,” she says, making a face. “I’m not one of your hockey bros, you can use my actual name.” She turns to the rest of the room. “No offense.”

“‘Sall good,” Jonesy says lazily.

She glances back at the television then. “Wait, where did the blue goalie go?”

In the time it takes Ryan and Cam to explain the empty net strategy, Ladd disappears.

Jane has class earlier than Ryan, so they head up to bed after the game.

Tim’s at his computer when they get there. “Are you guys sure you don’t want me to leave?”

Jane snorts.

“Extremely sure,” Ryan says firmly. They go to bed, and Jane curls up against his back. It feels nice, if not even remotely sexy.

–

Jane’s phone alarm goes off way too early. Ryan grunts as she climbs over him and pulls his blanket over his head.

“You don’t have to get up,” she says softly. “Just tell me where the dryer is.”

Ryan mumbles directions and dozes back off until Jane comes back and starts getting dressed. He opens his eyes to Jane’s bare chest.

“Christ, Janie, warn a guy.”

“Oh, like you care — and stop calling me that.”

“I’ll walk you down,” Ryan groans, and he throws the covers off. “I have to be up in half an hour anyway.”

“Thanks again,” Jane says.

“Any time,” Ryan says. “I mean it.” He does. He likes having friends outside of hockey who can help him take the blinders off every once in a while.

“See you later.” She squeezes his hand and he tugs on her braid, which gets him a mutinous look before she finally leaves. It makes him smile.

“She didn’t just leave while you were sleeping?” Ladd asks from the hall behind Ryan. “What a novelty,” he adds under his breath as he pushes past him to the empty kitchen.

“Fuck you,” Ryan says.

“Did that already,” Ladd mutters.

Ryan glances over his shoulder automatically, but no one is around. “You’re an asshole.”

“There’s a person attached to it,” Ladd says cattily.

A thousand things he can’t say in this house rest on the tip of his tongue. But he can’t do this here — he won’t. He grabs a cup of coffee for himself and turns to leave the kitchen. What the fuck is even wrong with Ladd? He doesn’t get his way, so he gets to try and ruin Ryan’s life? Fuck him.

His exit is blocked by Tim and some of the other guys who share the same class. “Kes, I’m sorry, dude,” Tim says, clapping him on the shoulder. “I didn’t mean to, but —”

“Didn’t mean to what?” Ryan asks. He should’ve let Jane see herself out.

“I totally saw your girlfriend’s tits this morning. It was an accident!”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Ryan sighs.

“Dude, you cuddled last night. Without even making out. She’s your girlfriend.”

“No,” Ryan says, after briefly considering just throwing his coffee on them all and running for the stairs. “She’s a lesbian.”

“Oh shit, bro!” Jared says. “You’re fucking a lesbian?”

“Way to go,” Tim says, giving him the thumbs up.

Ryan just stares at them all. “I — I have to get dressed.”

He doesn’t even realize that Ladd is following him until they’re right outside Ryan’s door and Ladd speaks from behind him.

“So I guess it’s okay for you to sleep with a girl, let her wear your clothes, cuddle with her. But when I fucking talk to a girl, it’s an offense worth a break-up?”

“What?” Ryan looks around in panic, but there’s no one in the hall. He pulls Ladd into his room and shuts the door.

“Okay, first of all, nothing is going to happen between Jane and me because we’re both gay. Second of all, it’s none of your fucking business — we are not dating anymore. Third of all, we were breaking up anyway.”

“What?” Ladd says.

Ryan levels a stare at him. “You blackmailed me into dating you. You didn’t actually think it was going to lead to some fairy-tale ending, did you?”

“Blackmail?” Ladd hisses. It’d be hilarious how offended he sounds if it weren’t so true.

“And I’d like to point out that you aren’t holding up your end of it. You’re supposed to leave me alone, not act like a jealous harpy.” Ryan turns away from him then, and rummages through his dresser for something to wear.

Ladd’s still standing there staring at him, but Ryan barely looks back. “You can leave now, your right to a free show has expired.”

The door slams hard behind him, and Ryan takes a deep breath, easing the grip he has on his drawer. That’s it. That should be the end. For real this time. He doesn’t feel relieved, just tired.

Class, he tells himself. And hockey. These are the important things. They’ve got a game tonight, and it has to go better than last week’s.

–

It does go better, sort of. The team plays well. Ryan plays well. Ladd plays well. They win. The problem is that Ryan and Ladd aren’t playing well together. They keep missing each other’s passes, and almost colliding, and by the third period Ryan is using Chris as a go-between just to limit the turnovers.

In the locker room, Ryan feels anxious, like he’s waiting for something to happen. It’s ridiculous. He turns to Ladd, because most things that are wrong with Ryan are Ladd’s fault, but Ladd isn’t looking at him. He’s talking to Eric. Ryan realizes he can’t actually remember the last time he looked and Ladd wasn’t looking back at him.

Well, good. That’s what Ryan wanted. Wants. It’ll be better this way.

Monday after practice, Eric holds him back while everyone is leaving. He has his captain face on, and Ryan suppresses a wince.

“You and Laddy need to work your shit out,” Eric says bluntly when everyone has gone.

“We’re not fighting,” Ryan says.

“I know,” Eric says. “It was kinda better when you were. At least then you’d look at each other.”

Ryan tries very hard not to react to that.

“Kinda hard to pass to someone you won’t look at,” Eric continues. And that’s not fair. Ryan looks at Ladd on the ice. Or, at his number, anyway, if not his face. “What happened? Did he sleep with your girlfriend or something?”

“She’s not — No. Nothing like that. We just. We don’t get along.”

“But you were getting along for a while there?” Eric makes it into a question, and Ryan doesn’t even know how to explain it. “Well, look,” Eric says when Ryan’s silence goes on long enough, “we can make the playoffs if we play well from here on out. And this team needs you two working together if we’re gonna do that. Whatever it is between you, you can’t let it affect the team anymore. Got it?”

“Got it,” Ryan says.

Eric slaps him on the shoulder and smiles. “You’re a good kid, and a damn fine hockey player. I know you can do it. Now let’s go get some food.”

–

The next day, he’s having lunch with Jane in town again, and she seems a little subdued.

“Is Andrew mad at me?” she asks finally.

“What? Why would you think that?” Jane and Ladd had always got along, since before Ryan knew Jane.

“I don’t know, I saw him when I was leaving campus earlier, and I waved and said hi, and I know he saw me because he looked right at me, but then he looked away and pretended he didn’t. But why would he be mad at me?”

Ryan clenches his jaw. “He’s not mad you, he’s mad at me. And if he’s taking it out on you, he’s an even bigger asshole than I thought.”

Jane nods, but she still looks unhappy about it.

“Maybe you can talk to him at the meeting today?” Ryan can’t believe he’s suggesting Jane actually make an effort to be friends with Ladd. “You can tell him he’s an idiot. It always makes you feel better when you tell people they’re idiots.”

Jane smiles. “Maybe I will.”

The next morning, he heads to the student union to study for a French quiz — there’s too much going on in the house, and the library just makes him sleepy, so he grabs a table in the union and spreads out.

He’s halfway through his list of irregular verbs when a voice interrupts his study flow.

“Uh, hey, Ryan, is anyone sitting here?”

Ryan looks up, and Mike is standing behind the empty chair on the other side of the table. “Oh, no, go ahead.”

Mike sits and sets his bag down. “Haven’t seen you around lately.”

“Yeah, things got a little crazy, had to focus more on hockey.” Ryan shrugs.

Mike nods and pulls out a chem book. “Gotta find your balance.”

“Exactly.” Ryan nods. “Fortunately, my course load isn’t quite as heavy as that.”

Mike rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I probably spend as much time on this as you do hockey.”

“No offense, man, but I think I made the better choice,” Ryan says, glancing at the open page of Mike’s book.

“It’s not all bad,” Mike insists. “Sometimes we get to explode things.”

Ryan laughs. “Remind me to stay on your good side.”

Mike grins. “I think you’re safe. So, sorry if I’m prying, but you and Andrew…”

Ryan grimaces.

“Yeah, okay,” Mike says. “Don’t have to say more.”

“Thanks,” Ryan says, picking up his French notes.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt your studying.”

“No, don’t worry about it, it’s just a quiz,” Ryan says.

They both study in silence for another half hour before Ryan looks at his phone. “I gotta go.”

“Good luck,” Mike says, removing his highlighter from his mouth.

“Thanks,” Ryan says, stuffing his stuff into his bag.

“Do you maybe wanna grab some coffee after your quiz?” Mike asks. He’s biting his lip like he’s a little nervous.

Oh.

“I — I’m sorry, Mike,” Ryan says, shrugging his backpack on awkwardly.

“No, don’t worry about it.”

“I’m just not in a place for any of that right now, you know?” Ryan tries.

“Oh, totally,” Mike says. “Good luck on your quiz.”

Halfway through French, when they’re done with their quiz and going through some dialogue, Ryan wonders why he didn’t just say he’d go out for coffee with Mike. Mike is nice, and good-looking, but Ryan didn’t even think of saying yes.

Maybe he’s just too used to being in the closet. But Mike seems cool, and he’d probably understand Ryan’s reasons for not wanting to come out. Jane probably has his number, and he could call him up, and they could have coffee, and maybe Mike would be a good kisser. He thinks about it, but the idea doesn’t stir anything in him except a vague sense of unease.

He has to focus on hockey anyway. The next few weeks are important if they’re gonna make the playoffs. He doesn’t have time to start dating anyone.

The professor calls on him then, so he reads out loud and doesn’t think about Mike anymore.

–

Ryan doesn’t actually talk to Ladd like Eric wanted before Friday’s game. He tries once, but there are other guys around, and it’s not really a conversation they can have then. And they’re never actually alone together the rest of the week. Which Ryan appreciates, so he works on looking at Ladd when appropriate during practice, and things click a little bit more. They can do this, they’ve been just teammates before. Hell, they’ve been teammates who hate each other before — they just needed time to get back to that.

The Red Hawks are giving the fits, but there’s no way they’re dropping two in-conference games in a row. Everyone on their bench is pushing for it, while both goalies are making insane saves.

So the hits start coming a little harder and a little faster, and it’s not that surprising when the giant defenseman wearing #12 slams into Ladd and sends him crashing into the boards.

Ryan passes back to Brian, waiting for Ladd to get up so they can reorganize their breakout. Ladd isn’t getting up.

Shit.

Ryan’s about to skate over there when Ladd makes it to his knees, then his feet, but he’s still leaning on the boards like they’re what’s holding him up. Ryan glances to the bench and meets Coach’s eye. Jonesy and Jared already have a leg over the boards, waiting to change.

But it will be easier if the puck’s in Lowell’s zone, so he takes a look at their positioning, taking special note of where big #12 is, calls for the puck, and skates it through the neutral zone. He blows by two of the forwards, passes to himself around the second defenseman, and wrists it toward the net. The goalie stops it with his pad, but the rebound comes right back to Ryan. He can hear Jonesy and Jared on the ice and in the zone now, and he passes it to Jared while the Red Hawks are still trying to figure out what’s going on.

He sets up in front of the net while Jared and Jonesy play keepaway and look for a good shot. #12 comes over and gives him a little bump to remind him to stay out of his goalie’s way, and that is what Ryan was waiting for. He shoves back. He’s smaller, but #12 wasn’t expecting Ryan to shove so hard and he wobbles.

“What the fuck?” he yells, and shoves Ryan back when he regains his balance.

“Shove it up your ass, dickweed,” Kesler sneers.

“What, you wanna go, pipsqueak?”

“Bring it on.” And Ryan throws off his gloves.

He doesn’t remember specifics of the fight, just trying to not get killed, and the cheers of his teammates and the fans. They both lose their helmets at some point, and #12’s meaty fist gets his cheek, but Ryan gets a few of his own in, and in the end they fall over together before the refs break it up.

The team really starts clicking while Ryan’s in the box, and he’s just waiting for the puck to go into the net. It’s Eric who finally does it, chipping it top shelf, blocker side. Ryan yells so loud the official sitting next to him looks a little alarmed.

But when he glances over at the bench, he notices Ladd’s still not back. It’s only been four minutes, but still. He drinks a little more Gatorade as he waits for the okay to hit the ice again.

He and #12 hit the ice again at the same time, but Ryan jumps into the play while the asshole skates back to the bench. He manages a shot on goal that rings off the post before skating back to the bench. Everyone slaps him on the back, even the coaches, but he doesn’t get a chance to ask what’s going on with Ladd.

The period ends before his next shift, and Ryan’s glad. The intermission will give the trainers a chance to tape Ladd up or whatever so he can get back on Ryan’s wing for the final period. Because Ladd’s going to be fine. Obviously, Ladd is going to be fine. He skated off under his own power. He’s probably just rattled and winded.

The guys are flying high in the locker room, and the coaches can barely make them pay attention. Ryan can’t get his heartbeat under control. It’s racing with the adrenaline from the fight and the goal. It would be really bad for the team if Ladd was seriously hurt. They can’t afford to lose Ladd. Especially not with Cam still out.

Tim shouts when Ladd walks back into the room, drawing everyone’s attention. He smiles and waves grandly to everyone, even though he’s walking carefully. He’s been stripped to his waist, and his ribs are taped. Peeking above the tape, Ryan can see the start of bruising, red and angry against the pale skin of Ladd’s chest.

Ryan looks down at his skates quickly.

“Ready to get back out there, Laddy?” Coach asks.

“You bet, Coach!” Ladd calls, and the guys all shout their encouragement.

“Then get suited up! You’re gonna be back on Kes’s left. Carry this momentum, and let’s finish them off, boys.”

Lowell has some good chances in the opening minutes of the period, but they’re able to shut them down. And when Jonesy wrists a shot in from the top of the circles, Ryan swears he can see the guys in red deflate.

During the final scramble with the empty net, Ryan blocks a shot off his shin, and it hurts like a motherfucker, but he doesn’t care. They’ve won, and no one was seriously injured. The fuckery from last week hasn’t completely screwed the team.

The locker room is hopping after the game, so it’s not a surprise that the second they’re left alone by the coaching staff, someone yells, “We’re gonna fucking rage!”

It’s Friday night, they’ve got the whole weekend to recover, and Ryan thinks it’s a fucking awesome idea.

By the time Ryan gets back to the house, it’s already crowded, music blaring and kegs in the kitchen. Ryan has no idea how they pull that off, but he’s not gonna complain. He grabs a beer and immediately gets called downstairs to be on Tim’s team in beer pong.

He’s back in the kitchen half an hour later considerably tipsier, and he fills up his beer and wanders into the den. It’s crowded. A few people are moving a little to the music, but nobody’s really dancing. He recognizes a bunch of the puck bunnies on the other side of the room and steers clear, even though he’s offended most of them by now and they leave him alone. He literally bumps into a goalie from the women’s hockey team, and they get into a spirited, drunken conversation about the game earlier and the Bruins’ chances this year.

When he looks back across the room, he sees a flash of shiny hair and big tits and yeah, it’s Brittany, and there’s Ladd, leaning against the wall in a way that clearly telegraphs the pain in his ribs. Ryan watches as Brittany reaches out to touch Ladd’s chest, and Ladd bats her hand away before it can touch him. She says something, and Ladd rolls his eyes and says something back, and she pulls away, stung. Ladd pushes himself off the wall and walks into the hallway toward his room. Brittany wanders back to her friends, her arms crossed over her impressive chest.

“Earth to Kes,” the goalie, he thinks her name is Sarah, says, snapping her fingers in front of his face.

“I’m here,” he says. “You were saying?”

“You all right there, kiddo?” she asks.

“I’m fucking great,” Ryan says, and smiles.

He throws himself into the rest of the party, taking up another round of beer pong and losing on purpose. The guys just keep feeding him drinks and recreating his fight — though they usually trip before the actual fight ended. But it makes him laugh, even though Jonesy seems pretty set on referring to the fight as “Kes defending Laddy’s honor.”

He catches Ladd’s eye one of the times it’s said, but Ladd doesn’t hear it, or doesn’t care. Or maybe Ryan’s too drunk to try and read any in-depth facial expressions.

–

Saturday morning — or more accurately, Saturday afternoon — Ladd’s not the only one moving like he’s been hit by a Mack truck. Alex lets out an impressive litany of curses when he stumbles into the kitchen, and the blinds are open with the sun streaming in. Ryan doesn’t actually mind, and that gets some disgruntled looks thrown his way.

“I know you drank at least as much as I did,” Tim bitches. “Why do you look so damn cheerful?”

“It’s a beautiful day, Timmy.” Ryan grins. He’s not really sure himself, but he’s willing to go with it.

“Oh my God, what happened to your face?” Jane yells when they get together to study later. Midterms are coming up, and Ryan really wishes they didn’t have to be right before the playoffs.

“Fight.” Ryan grins. “I’ll show you. The footage should be up on Youtube now.”

“Why are you in such a good mood?” Jane asks suspiciously. Why do people keep being weirded out just because he’s cheerful?

“We won the game, I had a good time at the party last night, and now I get to spend time with you.” Ryan smiles charmingly. “Why wouldn’t I be in a good mood?”

Jane doesn’t look convinced, but she does open her books, so that’s good enough.

–

Ryan’s good mood lasts straight until Monday morning, when going back to class brings him back down to earth.

They have practice that afternoon. Changing in the locker room beforehand, Ryan catches sight of Ladd taking off his t-shirt. The tape’s been taken off his ribs and the bruises are darkening to deep purple from his pecs to his hips.

He doesn’t even realize he’s maybe staring until Ladd says, “What? Ryan snaps his head up, and Ladd is looking right at him.

“Um, nothing,” he says. Then, “Your ribs feeling okay?”

“Sure,” Ladd says, giving him a confused look.

Ryan notices that Ladd’s skating a little gingerly without the adrenaline of a game to help him push through the pain. Ryan can’t help wincing with him when he takes a hit from Smitty during a drill, and when he skates over to see if he needs help up, it’s just a team thing. Ladd gives him a weird look, but Ryan just shrugs it off.

Jonesy’s being Jonesy — a dick — towards the end of practice when he goes to poke Ladd in the side with his stick. But he’s reaching across Ryan, so he slaps the stick down after it brushes Ladd’s jersey. “Don’t be a dick,” Ryan snaps.

“Worried someone’s going to steal your title?” Jonesy laughs. “Relax, man, Ladder doesn’t mind. And we have to toughen him up a bit.”

“He’s plenty tough. Just let him heal, fuckface,” Ryan says. But when he glances back to Ladd, there’s only an empty spot on the ice. Ladd’s at the other side of the ice, talking with Eric and Alex.

They have a weight training session Tuesday afternoon, and Ryan is surprised when Ladd shows up with the rest of them.

“Should you be lifting weights with your ribs?” Ryan asks softly in the hallway.

Ladd throws him a look. “I’ve been cleared by the trainers.”

“Okay,” Ryan says, but he keeps an eye on him anyway. He’s taking it easier than he usually does, which Ryan approves of, but toward the end of the session, his face is lined with pain. He stops before Ryan can decide if he should say something, so that’s good.

“Do you need some ice?” Ryan asks Ladd when they’re all getting dressed.

“I’m good.”

“Are you sure?” Ryan asks. “Because I could grab some and —”

“I’m sure,” Ladd says, a little too loudly. A few of the guys give them weird looks, and Ryan focuses on tying his shoelaces. He dawdles a little, and pretends to search for something in his bad so that he and Ladd are the last ones out.

“Hey,” Ryan says, “do you feel —”

“What is your problem?” Ladd bursts out.

“Wha —?” Ryan says, taken aback. “What do you mean?”

“You! You’re fucking hovering,” Ladd says, jabbing a finger at him.

“No, I’m not!” Ryan protests automatically.

“Yeah, you are,” Ladd snaps. “Stop it. Stop pretending like you care.”

“I’m not pretending. We’re…” friends is a gross overstatement and probably a lie. “We’re teammates,” Ryan finishes lamely.

“You never hovered over Cam like this, and you actually like him,” Ladd says. “So whatever it is you’re doing. Just. Just stop.”

I like you, Ryan almost says. But the truth of it startles him into silence.

“I’m leaving you alone, okay? It’s what you wanted, so how about you return the favor?”

Ladd is right. Ladd is totally right, and Ryan should leave him alone if that’s what he wants. But he’s also suddenly certain that he can’t let Ladd walk away.

“We’re linemates,” he insists. “I’m supposed to watch out for you.”

He really isn’t expecting Ladd to to grab him by the shirt and push him against the wall. “Since when?” Ladd growls in his face. “Since when does it even matter to you?”

Ryan reaches out and grabs Ladd’s shirt, to push him away, he thinks. But what he actually does is pull until Ladd is falling against him, and then he kisses him.

Ladd makes a startled noise, and Ryan lets go of his shirt to wrap his arms around Ladd’s waist and pull him closer, careful of his ribs. Ladd starts kissing him back then, hard, and Ryan swears muscles he didn’t even know he had relax, and he opens his mouth to let Ladd’s tongue inside.

After a minute, Ladd tears his mouth away and pushes until he’s an arm’s length away from Ryan. “What the hell are you doing?” he asks. “Anyone could walk by.”

“I don’t care,” Ryan says.

“Yes, you do. What the fuck?”

Ryan licks his lips, and he can see Ladd’s eyes follow the movement — and maybe he has a point. “Maybe we should go —”

Ladd hauls him into one of the trainers’ rooms, where someone’s left an Ace bandage out on the table.

“Explain,” Ladd says, taking a step back from Ryan.

“I — I want you,” Ryan says.

Ladd frowns, which wasn’t really the reaction he was expecting. “Yeah, well, I want Datsuyk’s takeaway numbers, so tough shit.”

Ryan huffs. He’s not saying this right, and Ladd’s just not getting it.

“No, you don’t get to be huffy just because I won’t be a place for you to stick your dick and then leave when you’re done,” Ladd says.

Ryan winces. Okay, yeah.

“I’m sorry,” Ryan says. Ladd’s eyes widen. “I, uh, I was kind of freaking out, and I didn’t think you’d care that much, but I shouldn’t have left like that, and I’m sorry.”

“You’re apologizing? To me?”

“Yes,” Ryan says more firmly. Jesus, trust Ladd to make this as difficult as possible. “And what you said before, I do like you, okay?” He swallows. “I like you a lot.”

Ladd just stands there, looking at him, and Ryan sighs and pushes his hair back from his face. “I’m not saying this right.”

“Are you fucking with me?” Ladd asks finally.

“What? No!”

“Because if you’re fucking with me —” Ladd points at him, “I will beat you to a pulp.”

Ryan grabs the hand Ladd’s pointing at him and uses it to drag him around and up against the table. He leans in close to Ladd’s face.

“I am not fucking with you, you dumb fuck! I like you. I think about you all the time, and I worry about you, and I fought a giant for you, and I hate it when other people touch you, because I want to be the only one touching you. I. Like. You.” He gentles his grip on Ladd’s arms and steps back a little, takes a deep breath. “And if I’ve already blown it, then I guess that’s my fault, but just fucking tell me that, instead of letting me make a fool of myself all over the place here.”

“I kinda like it when you make a fool of yourself.”

Ryan squeezes his eyes shut. “Andrew —” Ryan lets go of Ladd’s arm, only to have Ladd grab his wrist.

“It just seems fair,” Ladd says, his voice no longer tense. “I’ve been acting like an idiot over you for weeks now.”

“No, you haven’t,” Ryan says. He’s pretty sure he would’ve noticed.

“Yeah, I have,” Ladd says. “I like you. I think about you all the time, and I hate it when other people touch you, because I want to be the only one touching you. I get jealous of lesbians, for fuck’s sake.”

Ryan laughs a little at that, and Ladd grins, and holy shit, he hadn’t realized how much he missed seeing that directed at him. “So, we’re good?” Ryan asks.

“Almost,” Ladd says, tugging Ryan towards him by his arm until he can just lean in to kiss him.

God, Ryan missed this, and it’s such a relief to finally be able to admit that. He kisses Ladd slow and deep, and it’s so damn good his knees feel a little weak with it.

He makes a small whining sound that he will never admit to when Ladd pulls away.

“We really shouldn’t do this here,” Ladd says, and then kisses Ryan again like he just can’t help himself. Ryan knows he’s right, but he thinks if he doesn’t get to touch Ladd soon he’s going to go crazy.

“My room?” he suggests, hoping like hell that Tim isn’t around.

“Yeah,” Ladd says, and Ryan has to duck in and kiss him again because he can.

Tim isn’t there, thank god, and Ryan throws his bag down, flops on his bed, and pulls Ladd on top of him.

Ladd kisses him frantically, and Ryan kisses him back just as frantically. He tugs at Ladd’s shirt until he can get it up and off and runs his hands over Ladd’s bruises.

“Are you really okay?”

Ladd rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling. “Yes, Ryan, god.”

He reaches out and touches the bruise on Ryan’s face. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great,” Kesler says.

Ladd kisses him again and starts working at getting his pants off, an admirable plan of action in Ryan’s opinion. Then his phone starts ringing in his pocket and whoa, that’s an interesting sensation, compounded by Ladd reaching in and pulling it out. Ryan would’ve preferred he ignore the phone to pull out something else.

“Hey, Jane, he’s kind of busy right now…Yeah, tomorrow’s probably best,” Ladd says cheerfully into the phone.

Ryan can hear her laughing on the other end of the line.

“You could’ve let that go to voicemail,” Ryan points out.

“Where’s the fun in that?” Ladd asks, tossing the phone on the floor and returning his attention to Ryan’s pants.

–

They just lay there, skin to skin, for a while after, Ryan tracing the line of Ladd’s spine with the tips of his fingers.

“So, I’m pretty dumb, huh?” he says softly.

Ladd huffs a laugh into his neck. “Yeah,” he says, “but I like you anyway.”

“Shut up,” Ryan says, and smacks him lightly on the ass. Ladd’s hips shift when he does, and, oh shit.

“We really don’t have time for that,” Ladd says, a little breathlessly.

“Yeah, Tim’ll probably be back soon,” Ryan says. Someday, though, he promises himself, they are coming back to that.

“Ugh,” Ladd says, and he burrows back into Ryan’s chest. Ryan can’t think of a single reason to protest.

A few minutes later, they hear Tim shouting downstairs, and then it’s a mad scramble to find their clothes and get them all in order. Ryan ends up in Ladd’s shirt, and they don’t have time to switch.

When Tim comes in, they have their books out and are the very picture of diligent studying, except for the blush that Ryan is probably sporting. Tim doesn’t seem to notice. He just gives them a look and declares, “You guys are weird, you know that?”

“You’re weird,” Kesler shoots back.

About 10 minutes later, Ladd gets up.

“I should go,” he says. “I gotta call Seabs.”

“Tell him I said hi.” Ryan smirks. Ladd hovers over Ryan for a second, but they can’t exactly kiss goodbye with Tim right there, so Ladd just says, “See you tomorrow?”

“Breakfast?” Ryan suggests. It’ll mean getting up earlier, but it won’t be very crowded.
“Yeah,” Ladd smiles, and he lets himself out.

Ryan finishes his reading and moves to his desk to screw around on the internet for a while. Jane IMs him immediately, and he spends a while explaining that yes, he’s back with Ladd; yes, for good this time; yes, she’s a genius, and he should listen to her always.

He gets an email about 45 minutes later from Facebook. “Brent Seabrook wrote on your wall,” it says. Ryan opens up his Facebook page, and in all caps, Seabs has written, ABOUT TIME, FUCKHEAD.

Ryan laughs. Then he looks around his page. He’s been pretty much ignoring it for the last week and a half. It’s complicated with Andrew Ladd, it still says. He clicks on edit and changes it to In A Relationship.

It’s not exactly shouting it from the rooftops, but it works.

The One About the Appendix by beatperfume

Series: Extra Curriculars [3]
Fandoms: Hockey RPF
AO3 Categories: M/M
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Ryan Kesler/Andrew Ladd
Characters: Alexandre Burrows, Andrew Ladd, Ryan Kesler
Status: Completed
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Published: 2011-07-21
Updated: 2011-07-21
Packaged: 2023-12-04 17:14:57
Summary:

During his first NHL season, Andrew Ladd had an emergency appendectomy. This is a story about that.

The One About the Appendix

Author’s Note:

Follows Nothing Worth Knowing.

Thank you to shoemaster and doctor_denmark for being my audience, and to angelsaves for being my wonderful beta.

“I have finals,” is the first thing Jane says when Andrew picks up his cell phone, “And I can’t come down there to be by your bedside.”

“What?” Andrew says. “Why would you come here? You don’t need to come here.” Maybe it’s that the anesthesia hasn’t completely worn off yet, but this conversation isn’t making any sense.

“Then would you fucking call your boyfriend and tell him that? He’s driving me up the wall. He tried to buy me plane tickets.”

Andrew covers his eyes with his free hand and sighs. “I’m sorry,” he tells Jane.

“Don’t apologize to me,” she says. “Maybe if you’d, oh, I don’t know, called him since you had emergency surgery, he wouldn’t be bothering me.”

From the chair next to his bed, his mom is giving him a questioning look. Andrew waves his hand at her.

“My mom’s talked to him every morning and every night.”

“Yeah, like that’s gonna be enough to satisfy him.”

Her tone implies that Andrew should know better, and the thing is that he really really does. Which is one of the reasons he hasn’t called Ryan yet. Ryan’s such a fucking worrier. Andrew doesn’t need him motherhenning from 3000 miles away. That’s what he has his actual mother here for.

Plus, he had a wacky reaction to the anesthesia and he spent all night spewing mushy crap about Ryan at anyone who would listen, which luckily was mostly just his mother and the night nurse. Andrew’s really really glad Ryan has games and couldn’t be here. His mother just decided he was sober enough to handle his phone when Jane called.

“I’ll call him,” Andrew promises.

“You better,” Jane says. “I have studying to do and a thesis to write. I don’t have time for this shit.” Then her voice softens. “But I’m glad you’re okay. You scared us.”

“I know, I’m sorry.”

“Try not to let it happen again,” Jane says, and hangs up without saying goodbye.

His mom is still looking at him, so Andrew has to explain. “Jane says to call Ryan.”

“He’s very worried about you, honey,” his mom says, mildly.

Andrew rolls his eyes. “I know.”

He looks at his phone. He has 34 text messages from Ryan alone, and 20 from Seabs. Great.

His head is still too fuzzy to figure out the time difference and whether or not Ryan will be at practice, so he just sends him and Seabs a text that says, “I’m okay. Have my phone back now.”

His phone is ringing in under 30 seconds. It’s Ryan. Of course.

“Fuck you, you fucking douchebag asshole,” Ryan says. “Never do that again.”

“I can’t. Like, physically can’t,” Andrew points out. “I don’t have an appendix anymore.”

“Fuck you,” Ryan says again, and maybe it’s the shitty connection, or Andrew’s fuzzy head, but Ryan sounds awful. He’s probably been working out too much. That’s what he does when he’s stressed. “We play Minnesota in two days, but I could-”

“No,” Andrew says. “Ryan, no. That’s ridiculous.”

Ryan sighs. “I know, but-”

Andrew looks up and his mom is watching him intently. He narrows his eyes at her. “Hold on,” he tells Ryan. Then, to his mom, “Could you give us a minute?”

“Nothing you say to him could surprise me after last night,” she says.

“Mom! That’s not the point!”

Thankfully she gets up and leaves. Christ, what did Andrew even say last night?

“They’ll probably release me this afternoon. I’ll be fine.”

“I know,” Ryan says quietly. “But I want to see you.”

Hearing him say it makes Andrew’s stomach clench uncomfortably in a completely non-appendix related way. Most of the time he’s too busy to miss Ryan, and besides, they’re used to being apart. But sometimes phone calls really don’t cut it.

“It’d be a waste anyway,” Andrew says past the lump in his throat. Fucking anesthesia. “I mean, I’m not even allowed to have sex for like, weeks.”

“Oh, well in that case, you’re completely useless to me,” Ryan says. He’s trying for light, and not quite making it.

“I know,” Andrew says. “You just want me for my body. That’s okay. It’s a pretty great body.”

“God,” Ryan says, “you’re such an egomaniac.”

He talks to Ryan until a nurse comes in to give him his medication. Ryan sounds less like he’s going to spontaneously combust, and only offers to get on a plane to Raleigh twice more, so Andrew counts it as a success.

They do release him that afternoon, and after a quick stop at the RBC his mom drives him back to his apartment.

“I don’t know how you live like this, Andrew,” she says as she settles him into his bed. Andrew’s trying not grimace with how much it hurt to walk around for such a small amount of time.

“I’ve only lived here for two months,” he says. “And I’m not actually here that often,” He knows the apartment is a little … spare. But he really doesn’t have the time or energy to spend on decorating. Or grocery shopping.

“You can’t mend correctly here,” his mom says, picking up some of the t-shirts on his floor and putting them in his laundry bag. “You should come back to Maple Ridge with me.”

“Wait, what?”

“You can’t skate until after Christmas anyway, and it would be a lot easier on me, since I could look after you and get the house ready for the family at the same time.”

“But-”

“I already spoke with your coach and the team doctors.”

“Okay, but-”

“It really would make my life a lot easier.”

“Okay,” Andrew says. He feels a little like he’s been hit by a bus, which is pretty normal for how his mom works.

“Oh good. I already bought the plane tickets. We leave at 2:30 tomorrow. You’ll come back to Raleigh after Christmas.”

She leaves him with his laptop and the TV remote while she goes to get dinner, since there’s nothing in his fridge except some old take-out and Gatorade. He turns the TV to ESPN and picks up his phone.

“BC tmrw,” he texts Ryan.

“I know,” comes the reply a few minutes later.

Andrew rolls his eyes. He’s going to regret letting Ryan and his mom talk to each other, he just knows it.

ESPN is boring, so he calls Seabs.

“Babe! You’re alive!” Seabs says.

“A little thing like an appendix isn’t gonna get me down,” Andrew says.

“I knew that. You’ve called Kes, right?”

“Of course I have. Jesus, did he bother you too?”

“Only a little. I bothered him a little too. You know how he is.”

“No kidding. He’s blowing it out of proportion.”

“Yeah, just like you were totally cool about the concussion he got last year.”

“That was an illegal hit!”

“Sure thing, sweetie. So I hear you’re going back home.”

Andrew considers hanging up. “Is there some kind of phone tree about me that I don’t know about?”

“Yes,” Seabs says. “I have to call Fraz and Brouwer when I’m done talking to you.”

The worst thing is that Andrew can’t tell if Seabs is serious or not.

He tries to change the subject and makes Seabs tell him about Syracuse, and pretends to be interested.

His mom comes home with dinner and Seabs says, “No, it’s cool, Fraz is bugging me on IM anyway,” and hangs up.

Andrew needs better friends.

____

The next day it’s a shit show trying to get to the airport because Andrew isn’t allowed to carry anything and he refuses to let someone push him in a wheel chair.

“Honey, don’t be silly,” his mom says. “It will be easier this way.”

“Mom, no,” Andrew says as firmly as he can while leaning on the ticket counter, pressing his forearm to his stomach. “The doctors said I could walk.”

His mom rolls her eyes and says, “Fine.”

It takes them forever to get to their gate, and Andrew feels like his stomach is going to split open by the time they get there. He refused the Vicodin after his reaction to the anesthesia, so he takes out the aspirin and swallows two dry. His mom just looks at him and shakes her head.

They have first class seats. Thank god.

Andrew looks at his mom suspiciously. “Did you use my credit card for this?”

“What did you say, honey?” she asks without looking up from her book or her orange juice.

Of course she did. Which is fine, because now he makes more money than he knows what to do with, but geez, she could have at least asked.

Whatever. It’s a good 6 hours to Vancouver and Andrew plans to sleep the whole time. He puts his seat as far back as it will go, tucks a pillow against his stomach for support, and dozes off.

His mom wakes him up when they’re descending into Vancouver and he has to put his seat back up.

“Are you sure you don’t want a wheelchair?” she asks as they deplane.

“I’m sure,” he says and steels himself for the walk to baggage claim. He’s way more likely to be recognized here than Raleigh, and he’ll be damned if he’s going to be in a wheelchair if that happens.

He’s expecting his dad to be waiting for them, so he’s surprised when they get to baggage claim and Ryan is there, surrounded by a crowd of kids, and signing autographs. He sees them, says something to the kids, and they all run off.

Ryan jogs over to them.

“Why aren’t you in a wheelchair?” he asks.

“I’m allowed to walk,” Andrew grits out.

“You look like shit,” Ryan says, and puts his shoulder under Andrew’s, taking most of his weight.

“I don’t need-”

“Shut up,” Ryan says, and deposits him in a chair. “Stay there. I’ll get your bags.”

“Nice to see you, too,” Andrew grumbles when Ryan heads to the baggage carousel.

Ryan has Andrew’s duffel and his mom’s rolling suitcase when he comes back. He watches closely as Andrew gets up slowly, then offers his shoulder again. Andrew wants to tell him to fuck off, except that he hasn’t gotten to touch Ryan in what seems like forever, and his shoulder is solid and warm. Also, Ryan would probably insist and then there would be a big scene.

“I can take my suitcase,” his mom offers.

“Oh no, I can get it,” Ryan says, like carrying two bags and Andrew, practically, is no big deal. “My car isn’t far.”

By ‘not far’ Ryan apparently means ‘right outside,’ which it is, running, and being guarded by a security officer who Andrew is pretty sure should be towing the car, not opening the trunk for Ryan.

His mom settles him in the back seat while Ryan loads the bags and thanks and fist bumps the security officer.

“No problem, Kes,” the guy says, and walks off.

“Since when are you charming enough to convince people to do things for you?” Andrew huffs. He doesn’t know why it irritates him so much. Maybe because the aspirin wore off hours ago.

“Andrew!” his mom scolds, but Ryan just turns and smiles at him. Andrew refuses to be charmed.

“I just explained the situation,” Ryan says. “And signed something for his kid. It’s good to be a Canuck.”

Ryan flips on the radio as they leave the airport, and his mom rummages in her bag and wordlessly hands him the aspirin and his antibiotics.

Ryan has a case of Gatorade in the seat next to Andrew, so he snags one and starts to open it. He can actually feel Ryan’s eyes on him in the rear view mirror. He knows what Ryan’s thinking.

“I can open a bottle of Gatorade,” Andrew says.

“Okay,” Ryan says, but doesn’t look away.

“Watch the road!” Andrew snaps.

“Honey, take your pills,” his mom says. He does, only barely placated by the fact that it’s his favorite flavor of Gatorade.

Ryan hums along with the radio, taking way more looks in the mirror at Andrew than necessary. He’s not going to keel over, for fuck’s sake. His mom calls his dad and tells him they’re on their way. It would almost be nice, if it weren’t for the fact that Andrew is supposed to be playing a game in Tampa Bay right now.

Some of the pain in his head and abdomen has receded by the time they get to the house. His dad comes out to meet them, gives Andrew a careful hug and slaps Ryan heartily on the back.

“I’ll get the bags,” he says to Ryan, “You just take care of Andrew.”

“Oh sure, leave me with the hard job,” Ryan jokes. Andrew grits his teeth.

“We’ll shout when dinner’s ready,” his mom says, and waves them off.

Ryan takes Andrew’s weight on his shoulder again. It’s basically like every time Ryan got him home when he was drunk in college, except there probably won’t be blowjobs at the end of it this time.

Ryan gets Andrew to his room, sits him down on the bed, then putters around moving things to the nightstand so Andrew can reach them: a box of tissues, the remote for his sound dock, a phone charger left under his desk.

Andrew glares at him.

“Ryan. Come here.”

“Do you need something?” Ryan asks, stepping toward Andrew.

“Yes,” Andrew says, grabs the front of Ryan’s shirt, and pulls him down so Andrew can kiss him. Ryan kisses back for a minute before he pulls away.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

Andrew can’t even answer in words, just in a frustrated grunt, and pulls Ryan back to him. Luckily Ryan gets the hint and opens his mouth for Andrew’s tongue, and then, after another minute, starts kissing back harder. His hands come up to grasp the side of Andrew’s face, curling around to the back of his head and holding him in place as his lips move fiercely over Andrew’s.

It feels so fucking good.

Andrew tilts his head back, and then some movement he didn’t realize he made makes his stomach protest and makes an involuntary noise. Ryan stops kissing him immediately.
Dammit.

“I’m fine,” Andrew says. “Don’t stop.”

“I’m hurting you,” Ryan says, and he doesn’t sound good.

“You’re not,” Andrew tries to assure him. “It was just an awkward position. Here.” He lies down on his side and pulls Ryan down to face him. “This will be better.” Ryan still looks hesitant. “I haven’t seen you in four months, asshole. Will you please just kiss me?”

Ryan scoots closer and nips Andrew’s bottom lip. “You scared the shit out of me,” he says.

“I’m sorry,” Andrew says, even though it’s not his fault his appendix decided to explode, or whatever. He’s willing to admit, at this moment and never again, that if he got a call saying Ryan was in emergency surgery, he wouldn’t react well either.

He kisses the underside of Ryan’s jaw and says, “But hey, I’m fine, and I’m here. And you’re here.”

“True,” Ryan says. Then he curls his hand around the back of Andrew’s neck and finally gets back to the business of kissing.

They stay like that until his mom calls them down for dinner. Ryan pulls away reluctantly and flops onto his back.

“This is going to be a problem,” he sighs. His hard on is tenting his jeans a little, and Andrew wants to blow him so bad he can suddenly taste it.

“I could-”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” Ryan cuts him off. “Just give me a minute.”

Andrew would protest, but his stomach does kinda hurt, and his mom is shouting for them again. Ryan has his eyes squeezed shut and is muttering something to himself that Andrew can’t quite make out. He’s such a freak. He’s not really hard anymore though. Andrew thinks that’s a damn shame, out of habit.

Andrew manages to get downstairs on his own, mostly by clutching the banister, but it’s victory nonetheless. He picks at his dinner because it’s been a long fucking day and he’s exhausted. It’s almost midnight in Raleigh anyway. Ryan and his parents chat away. Seeing them like this, Andrew thinks, you’d never believe Ryan almost didn’t get on the plane the first time he was supposed to come to Vancouver to meet them. He lets the conversation wash over him without paying much attention until he hears his name.

“Huh?” he says, looking up. Everyone is looking at him.

“Maybe you should just go to bed,” his mom says. He blinks a few times.

“Maybe that’s a good idea,” he admits.

Ryan helps him back up the stairs and into bed, then gets him his aspirin and a bottle of water.

“You should stay,” Andrew says. Ryan kneels next to the bed, leans over and kisses him quickly.

“Can’t,” he says. “Morning skate tomorrow.”

“Minnesota,” Andrew remembers.

“Yup. Next day off though, definitely.”

“‘Kay,” Andrew agrees, and falls asleep before Ryan leaves.

___

Over the next few days Andrew mostly sleeps and eats and watches TV. He starts to feel a lot better, which is great, except for how he’s still not allowed to do anything and he’s incredibly bored. He doesn’t think he’s ever gone this long without playing hockey or working out since he started playing. His mom allows him short walks around the neighborhood, which are completely unsatisfying because it’s cold and damp, and anyway, there’s nowhere to go.

He texts Seabs and Ryan and Jane a lot. Seabs will respond if he’s around, but he’s busy in Syracuse. Jane mainly responds with some form of “BUSY! FINALS!” or “that’s very nice but why can’t you bother ryan?”

After a few days of this Ryan shows up at Andrew’s house with his XBox.

“I’m leaving it here until Christmas,” Ryan says as he sets it up. “Consider it your present from Jane and Seabs.”

“Having a conversation with me once in a while would not lead to her failing out of college,” Andrew complains.

“She’s having trouble with her thesis.” Ryan’s voice is muffled from being behind the TV. He pops his head back out. “Leave her alone for a few days and she’ll probably start feeling guilty, and then she’ll call you.” He does have a point.

“What do I need to talk to her for now that I have video games?” Andrew grins. “What games did you bring?”

Ryan holds up NHL 12 before popping it into the machine.

“Sweet. I call the Hurricanes.”

Ryan snorts. “You’re welcome to them.”

“You won’t be saying that when I’m kicking your ass.”

“In your dreams.” Ryan hands him a controller. “Need anything before we start? Water? Aspirin?”

Andrew rolls his eyes. “I can walk to the kitchen all by myself now.”

“My willingness to wait on you hand and foot isn’t going to last forever, you know.”

Andrew considers. “Maybe some Gatorade?”

“Thought so,” Ryan smirks, and gets up.

“Wait,” Andrew says. When Ryan turns around he tugs at the bottom of Ryan’s shirt until he leans down and kisses him. “Now get me my Gatorade.”

“So demanding,” Ryan says, but he’s smiling when he walks into the kitchen.

Andrew can’t stop smiling while he changes the uniform options. It sucks that he can’t play any actual hockey right now, but he has video games, and he has Ryan, and that’s pretty awesome.

When Ryan comes back with his Gatorade, Andrew has to kiss him again as a thank you, and that gets a little out of hand. Andrew’s feeling a lot better, but he’s still not allowed to have sex, and Ryan knows it.

“Game,” Ryan says after a few minutes, and pulls away. Andrew was wrong: everything is awful.

After a few minutes, though, he forgets about making out, because Ryan is a competitive asshole about video games, and Andrew is not about to let him win. They get really into it, chirping each other, knocking each other with their elbows. Ryan wins a game, then Andrew wins a game, so obviously they have to play a third as a tie-breaker.

In the middle of the second period, Andrew scores a goal to take a 2-0 lead. “Ha! Take that Bobby Lu!” he yells, and throws his hands up in the air without thinking. “Oh fuck,” he grunts as he pulls something and curls over his stomach.

“Shit,” Ryan says. The game music stops. He feels Ryan’s hands on his back. “Are you okay? Do I need to call the doctor?”

“I’ll be fine,” Andrew says through clenched teeth. “Just give me a minute.”

“Maybe we should nix hockey games for the rest of the day, huh?”

“Ugh,” Andrew says. After a few minutes, it no longer feels like his stomach is going to explode, and he sits up a bit.

“Come ‘ere,” Ryan says, and maneuvers him so Andrew’s head is on his lap. He grabs a pillow from the other side of the couch and puts it against Andrew’s stomach for him to hold. Then Ryan just runs his fingers through Andrew’s hair. It’s nice, and it’s soothing and all, Andrew just wishes he didn’t have to be injured for it to happen.

“Only you would aggravate your surgical wound playing video games,” Ryan says.

“Shut the fuck up,” Andrew says.

___

That weekend the Canucks have a roadtrip. Just a short swing through Alberta, but Ryan will be gone for three days.

“He’ll be back before you know it,” his mom tells him during dinner.

“Yeah, I’m devastated,” Andrew says, rolling his eyes. “He can’t hover for three whole days.”

His mom and dad give each other a look and Andrew grits his teeth. He’s perfectly capable of existing without his boyfriend, thanks. He does it for 10 months out of the year just fine.

After dinner he plays some Call of Duty. Three days without Ryan means three days to beat his ridiculously high score. After a while, though, he gets bored, so he goes upstairs and emails Jane the picture his mom took earlier in the week. It’s of him and Ryan asleep on the couch. Andrew’s head is in Ryan’s lap, and Ryan’s head is tilted back on the couch, and his mouth is open. He looks ridiculous. Jane will appreciate it.

He screws around on the internet a little, but it’s pretty boring, and there’s no Facebook to occupy himself with since he deleted it last year.

He goes downstairs and turns on a hockey game, but it’s Toronto versus Boston and incredibly boring.

He sighs.

“You okay there, kiddo?” his dad asks from the kitchen.

“Fine,” Andrew says. “Just bored.”

“Mmm-hmm,” his dad says. Andrew narrows his eyes, but his dad just continues with, “You could read a book.”

“Yeah, right, Dad,” Andrew says, and flops back on the couch. The game goes to intermission a few minutes later, and Andrew gets up and goes to check his email again. Jane’s replied with, “AWWWWWW. BRB, printing this out and looking at it forever! How are you doing with Ryan gone for the weekend? xoxo”

Andrew snorts and doesn’t reply. Instead, he pulls out his phone and calls Seabs.

“Hey babe!” Seabs says when he picks up. It sounds loud where he is.

“Seabsie, I’m bored,” Andrew whines. “Where are you?”

“Just a bar with some of the guys,” Seabs says. “Poor baby, nothing to do with Ryan gone for the weekend?”

“It has nothing to do with Ryan,” Andrew snaps. “I’m perfectly capable of living my life with Ryan not around!” Okay, yes, video games are more fun with two players, and boring hockey games are less boring with someone around to point out all the stupid parts with, but Andrew doesn’t need Ryan around.

“Oooookay, sore spot,” Seabs says.

“It’s not-”

“You know,” Seabs interrupts, as the sound of music and people shouting fades and is replaces by wind and traffic. “You and Ryan do more than fine being across the continent from each other most of the year. It’s okay to want him around when you’re in the same province. And since you can’t distract yourself by playing hockey or anything.”

“That’s not-”

“It’s okay to admit you miss him,” Seabs says. “No one’s going to think any less of you.”

We’re not you and Duncs, Andrew almost says, but stops himself because there’s no need to mention Keith, even if he is bored and irritated.

“He makes things less boring around here,” he admits instead. Seabs laughs.

“You two are ridiculous. Now go call him and let me get back to drinking.”

Ryan picks up after the first ring and Andrew expects to hear the same bar noises that he heard from Seabs, but instead it’s quiet when Ryan says, “Hey.”

“Hey,” Andrew says. “Where are you?”

“In my hotel room,” Ryan says. “Watching Toronto/Boston. God, this shit is boring.”

Andrew smiles. “I know, right?”

___

Apparently Andrew’s parents like to sit down and watch Canucks games together. His dad always watched, but his mom never really had interest in hockey that Andrew wasn’t playing.

“Oh, I like to watch Ryan play,” she says when Andrew brings it up. “Of course, if you’re playing, we watch that instead,” she says quickly. Andrew narrows his eyes at her. At some point he’s going to have to address the fact that she appears to like Ryan more than him.

Right now, though, it’s good, because it means he doesn’t have to fight for the remote just so he can watch Vancouver play Calgary. It’s not that he misses Ryan so much he’s resorting to watching him on TV or anything. He and Ryan always watch each other’s games if they can. And how else is he supposed to tell Ryan all the things he’s doing wrong?

He keeps up a running commentary with his dad about the game in general, while his mom wanders in and out, checking on dinner, and taking a phone call from his aunt about Christmas Eve.

Ryan’s been centering the third line all year, so his ice time isn’t that high, but he tends to make the most of it. Andrew can’t help the little thrill that goes through him when Ryan checks someone hard into the boards at the ‘Nucks blue line. A little zing of pride that makes him want to brag, “that’s my boyfriend.” He keeps his mouth shut, but he can’t quite keep the smug smile off of his face. Thankfully, his dad doesn’t say anything.

The Canucks win by two and Ryan gets an assist. “I was watching and you couldn’t even score a goal for me?” Andrew texts him after the game. “Also, your coverage down low on the Iginla chance was for shit.”

“I’d like to see you do better, gimpy,” Ryan texts back 45 minutes later.

The next night, in Edmonton, Ryan scores a power play goal. After he’s finished celebrating, he looks right into a camera and points. Andrew smiles.

___

Ryan gets back late Sunday night, and goes directly to his apartment to sleep. Andrew’s antsy waiting for him to come over Monday afternoon after practice. Not that he misses Ryan or anything, he’s just bored. Also, horny, because he’s feeling a lot better now, and has done a lot of cuddling with his boyfriend, and he hasn’t gotten orgasms out of any of it. Possibly he hasn’t gone so long without an orgasm since he hit puberty.

Andrew’s just sitting at the kitchen counter, watching his mom bake Christmas cookies, when his cell phone rings. It’s Ryan, which means he must be on his way. Thank God. His mom is probably going to make him help soon, and that can only end in disaster.

“Hey,” Andrew says

“Hey,” Ryan says. “I’m on my way over.” Something about his voice sounds weird. “And I have company.”

“Company?” Andrew says. Who would Ryan bring over? Seabs, Brouwer, and Fraz are all still out of town, and Ryan doesn’t know anyone else Andrew knows in BC. The only people Ryan knows in BC are Andrew’s family and his teammates.

“Yeah,” Ryan says, trying to sound normal and totally failing. “Bur wanted to come say hi.”

Bur? Who the fuck is Bur? Wait. “You mean, like, Alexandre Burrows, your teammate? What the hell, why are you bringing him?”

“Yeah, well, I tried to tell him you’re a complete bore, but he wouldn’t listen,” Ryan says. He sounds like maybe he’s gritting his teeth a little bit. Which means that bringing Burrows along probably wasn’t his idea, and also, he’s probably sitting right next to Ryan. Great.

“Great,” Andrew says, and drops his head into his hands.

“We’ll be there in like, 20 minutes,” Ryan says, and hangs up.

“Ugggggh,” Andrew groans.

“Problems?” his mom asks lightly.

Andrew already showered after hitting the bike in the morning, but now he goes upstairs to put on jeans instead of the sweatpants he’s been wearing. He looks around his room, trying to see if there’s anything that would shout “Andrew and Ryan are dating!” to someone. Not that he plans on letting Burrows into his room, but you never know, as Burrows’ upcoming presence would suggest.

There’s the picture of him and Ryan asleep on the couch that his mom printed out, and there’s a picture of them from college. They’re both in their Catamounts jerseys and have their arms around each other. It probably wouldn’t even look weird to someone who doesn’t know them, but Andrew puts both pictures in his desk drawer anyway.

When he goes back downstairs his mom has put together a bunch of snacks: a mix of things their team nutritionists would approve of, and Christmas cookies. Andrew snags one of the cookies. “Sorry about this,” he tells her.

“It’s not a problem,” she says. “It was only a matter of time, I suppose. I just don’t want to say anything by accident.”

Andrew feels bad all over again. He and Ryan are used to pretending in public, but his mom isn’t. “Don’t worry about it,” he says. “I don’t think Burrows is known for his insight.” He grins at her, and she smiles back, obviously relieved.

Actually, Andrew has no idea if Burrows is perceptive enough to pick up on something. He’s never met him, though he knows that Ryan is friends with him.

A few minutes later, they hear Ryan’s car pull up.

Ryan lets himself in through the garage, like he always does. Andrew hates that he has to wonder if that seems weird to Burrows. Sure, he’s used to pretending in public, but this isn’t public, and he had emergency surgery and he just wants to spend time with his boyfriend without stressing.

“Hey!” Ryan calls out.

“In the kitchen!” Andrew shouts back. Fuck it. If nothing else, he and Ryan are good friends. If Burrows thinks that’s weird, he can go screw himself.

Ryan’s wearing his fake smile that he thinks fools people. Andrew wonders if Burrows knows Ryan well enough to recognize it. Ryan immediately hugs Andrew’s mom and gives her a kiss on the cheek.

“Thanks for having us, Kim,” he says. “Even though Bur was totally rude and invited himself over.”

Burrows at least looks a little ashamed. “Sorry,” he says. “But Kes has been disappearing so often lately. I had to find out if this ‘friend’ really existed. We all thought Kes didn’t believe in them.”

Andrew has to laugh at the face Ryan makes, but also because it’s true. He’s gotten better since college, but that’s not saying much.

“I’m Andrew,” he says, holding out his hand.

“Alex,” Burrows says. “You had your appendix out?” His voice is nasal, and his accent is still thickly French.

“Yup,” Andrew says.

“That’s too bad. And then you only have Kes for company. That’s too bad too.”

Andrew shrugs. “I’m used to it.”

“You’ve been friends for a long time?”

“Since freshman year of college,” Ryan interjects, sitting down at the counter and grabbing a cookie. “And when I came to Vancouver, Kim and Dave helped me settle in and made sure I knew how to do laundry.”

Burrows nods and grabs some of the carrots on the tray. Andrew’s mom starts asking him questions like how long he’s been in Vancouver and if he played juniors or if he went to college. Burrows answers politely, so at least there’s that.

Ryan kicks his foot, and when he turns to look at him, makes a face, half “can you believe this?” and half “sorry.” Andrew shrugs and nudges his leg back.

After a few more minutes, he interrupts his mom and says, “How about some video games?”

Ryan and Burrows nod. Andrew says to his mom, “If you need any help-”

“I’ll ask Ryan,” she says.

“I’m pretty sure there’s nothing about helping in the kitchen that I’m not allowed to do anymore.”

“Sure, honey,” his mom says. “But you’re not very good at it, are you?”

Ryan and Burrows snicker behind him, and Andrew sighs. “Fine. I won’t help. Happy now?”

“Go play your video games,” his mom says, and shoos him out of the kitchen.

“Oh, so this is where your XBox went,” Burrows says when they get to the den.

“I told you,” Ryan says.

“Yes,” Burrows says, and settles himself on the armchair. “But I didn’t believe you, because you like your video games more than you like most of your teammates.”

“That’s because you’re all assholes,” Ryan says, and throws a controller at Burrows.

“Call of Duty?” Andrew asks, because he doesn’t like the way this conversation is going. Hopefully Burrows will be easily distracted by animated guns.

Things get a lot less awkward after that, because they’re all focused on the screen. Burrows isn’t as competitive as Ryan and Andrew, but he’s not shy about trash talking both of them creatively.

After about an hour Burrows gets up to go to the bathroom. As soon as he’s out of the room, Ryan drops his head on Andrew’s shoulder.

“I’m really sorry,” he says softly into Andrew’s sleeve. “He wouldn’t let me go. He followed me to my car and refused to leave.”

Andrew twists his hand in Ryan’s hair. “It’s okay,” he says. “You been getting shit in the locker room?”

Ryan shrugs. “Nothing major.”

Which means yes, but Ryan’s not going to tell him about it. In that case, it’s probably for the best that Burrows insisted on coming with him. The last thing Ryan needs is rumors about him in the locker room.

They hear Burrows’ footsteps in the hall, and Ryan straightens up. Andrew misses his weight against his side and tells himself to suck it up. Having Ryan with him is making him soft. After Christmas he’ll go back to Raleigh, and Ryan will stay here, and they won’t see each other for four and a half months. More, if both teams can manage to make the playoffs. And they’ll both fucking deal with it, because that’s what they do.

“Ready for more ass kicking?” Andrew asks Burrows as he sits.

“I hope you’re ready to take it,” Burrows says, and they start again.

Ryan leaves before dinner, dragging Burrows with him. If he’d been alone, he would have stayed for dinner, and probably would have watched a movie with Andrew afterwards. Now Andrew won’t see him for another 2 days because the Canucks have a game tomorrow.

“Optional skate Wed. morning,” Ryan texts when he gets back to his apartment. “I’ll skip and come work out with you.”

It only makes Andrew feel marginally better.

___

By the time Ryan shows up midmorning on Wednesday, Andrew is so bored and frustrated, he’s ready to scream. He backs Ryan against the hallway wall and kisses him like he wanted to two days ago, but more, because he didn’t get to. Ryan’s hands are tight on his hips, holding him close, and he kisses back like he was feeling the exact same thing.

When Andrew’s hips start moving restlessly against Ryan’s, Ryan pulls away. “Not gonna be able to work out if we do this much longer,” he says, then kisses Andrew quickly. “Come on.”

And Andrew is left holding himself up against the wall with a hard on tenting his shorts.

“Fuck,” he says. Then he follows Ryan to the basement.

The “gym” in his parents’ basement isn’t much, just a stationary bike and a decent weight machine, but it does fine for Andrew when he’s home.

Andrew starts on the bike, because he’s still not really allowed to lift weights. He and Ryan don’t talk. They each put their headphones in and focus on their workouts. It’s almost like they’re back in college, except without the super nice facilities and 20 other teammates. So not really like college at all, except how he and Ryan are working out together, and watching Ryan’s muscles work and sweat start to break out across his chest makes Andrew wants to blow him.

He zones out listening to music and watching Ryan lift until his time is up, then he just drinks water and watches Ryan more. It wasn’t so bad when he was feeling weak and pained from surgery still, but now that he hasn’t felt a tweak from his abdomen in a while, he can’t stop thinking about how Ryan is right there.

After a few minutes Ryan notices him looking, pops an earbud out and says, “What?”

Andrew leans over the bars of the bike and says, “I want to blow you. Right now.”

“Wha-?” Ryan says. “You’re not-”

“I feel great,” Andrew says. “And horny. And I want to blow you.”

Ryan shifts on the bench. “Your mom’s like, right upstairs.”

“She knows we have sex.”

“Yeah, but I don’t think she wants to hear it.”

“So be quiet.” Andrew gets off the bike and straddles the weight bench so his knees are knocking against Ryan’s. “You’re going back to Michigan in a few days and then we won’t see each other for months.” He leans forward and kisses Ryan slow and dirty. Ryan whimpers and cups the back of Andrew’s head.

“Shit,” he says when he stops to breathe. “Your room okay? We can at least lock the door.”

Andrew slams the door and shoves Ryan against it as soon as they get to his room. They’re kissing hard and deep and it’s been so fucking long since they got to do this, and Ryan smells like sweat, and Andrew feels a little weak with it. But letting his knees buckle would mean Ryan stopping, so instead, he just leans into Ryan more.

It has the added bonus of bringing their hips into contact, the thin material of their gym shorts doing very little to muffle the sensation of their cocks rubbing together.

Ryan manages to pull away, knocking his head back against the door in the process, but he doesn’t seem to notice. “Bed,” he says, and pushes Andrew over to the bed. “On your back,” he says, and Andrew does as he says immediately.

Ryan unties Andrew’s sneakers and throws them over his shoulder, barely missing Andrew’s laptop. Andrew doesn’t care. His socks follow, then his shorts, and then Andrew only has a t-shirt on, and Ryan straddling him. His hips buck without his permission, and Ryan leans down heavier there, keeping them still.

“Stay still,” Ryan says.

“Get your clothes off,” Andrew counters.

Ryan leans over and licks Andrew’s left nipple. “Patience,” he says.

“Fuck you,” Andrew grits out. He’s so hard he’s almost in pain. Jesus, it’s been way too long.

“Not today,” Ryan says, and licks the other nipple. Andrew is going to kill him.

“Ryan,” Andrew says, “I can’t-” He can’t finish that sentence, because Ryan bites the nipple he’s been licking and all that comes out is a groan. Ryan sits up and then finally, finally, his hand is on Andrew’s dick, moving fast and sure in a rhythm guaranteed to get Andrew off as quickly as possible.

“Come on, come on,” Ryan’s saying softly, and Andrew wants to laugh, because he couldn’t hold back, even if he tried.

He comes not long after that, and Ryan leans over to muffle his groans by kissing him, and Andrew’s pretty sure he’s never felt better than this.

When he starts being able to process thoughts again, Ryan is still kissing him, and his hips are moving restlessly. He’s holding himself up, trying not to put too much weight on Andrew, and while it’s probably a good idea, Andrew really just wants Ryan’s weight pinning him to the bed. Instead, he reaches down and slips his hand inside Ryan’s shorts. He makes a choked off noise into Andrew’s mouth.

“You should’ve taken your clothes off earlier,” Andrew says. Because there’s no way he’s stopping now, not even to get Ryan’s clothes off.

“Shut up,” Ryan says, and Andrew twists his hand in that way he knows Ryan likes, and Ryan gasps and tucks his face into Andrew’s neck.

“Make me,” Andrew says. Ryan bites Andrew’s neck and then soothes it with his tongue, and Andrew tries to calculate how soon they’ll be able to do this again.

Ryan goes still when he comes, and his hissed-out “Fuck” vibrates across Andrew’s throat.

Andrew pulls his hand out of Ryan’s shorts as Ryan tips himself to the side. Normally they would just collapse on top of each other, which is one of the advantages of being almost exactly the same size. But Andrew’s okay with it, since it means Ryan’s more likely to let this happen again before he leaves.

His hand is covered in jizz, and instead of reaching for the tissues, he just sticks his fingers in his mouth.

“Jesus,” Ryan says, his hand sliding across Andrew’s waist and pulling him in closer.

“I wanted to blow you,” Andrew says, and licks across his palm. Ryan groans and turns his head against Andrew’s shoulder.

“Fuck, next time, okay?”

“Mmmhmm,” Andrew says. He wipes the rest of his hand off on the sheet and maneuvers so he can get his arms around Ryan, who is finally kicking off his shoes and shorts.

Finally, he thinks, this appendectomy thing is working for me.

___

The Canucks play the Kings at home two days before Ryan leaves for Michigan, and Ryan gets tickets for Andrew and his parents.

Andrew’s been to Rogers Arena before - every chance he could when he was growing up - but he hasn’t been there to watch a game since he started playing in the NHL, and he’s never seen Ryan play there. His excitement most closely resembles a six-year-old at Christmas, and he tries not to let it show too much.

He stands in front of his closet 20 minutes before they’re supposed to leave and tries to figure out what to wear. He feels like a girl going on a date, but it’s a little tricky. He didn’t even bring a suit back with him. He can’t really wear Canucks gear, despite the fact that Ryan left one of his hoodies here the other day. He could wear his ‘Canes stuff, with his actual number on it, but he doesn’t feel the need to broadcast it. In the end, he goes with a UVM hoodie that’s only a little tight across his shoulders, then bows to his inner teenage girl and puts on his best jeans.

His parents want to have an early dinner in the city, and Andrew doesn’t object because he’s barely left the house at all since he got home. And by next week he’ll be back in Raleigh, so now’s the time to appreciate his parents’ company. He manages to get his credit card to the server before his parents can think to pay, and it’s a nice time, and the food is good.

They get to Rogers before warmups. Their seats are excellent - the kind of seats that Andrew never had when he was younger, and doesn’t use now that he’s a player. He texts Ryan to let him know they’re here, and to tell him not to fuck up, and to watch out for Kopitar.

“Noted,” Ryan texts back.

Three minutes later, he gets a text from Burrows. It’s a surprise since as far as he knows, Burrows doesn’t have his number.

“Hey dude,” the text says, “come out with the boys after the game. You can walk and shit, right?”

Andrew texts Ryan, “Why is Burrows texting me?” But he doesn’t get a reply, and when he looks up, he sees it’s because the teams are coming out for warmups.

“Oh, there’s Ryan,” his mom says, happily. Andrew glances her way. He knows Ryan’s brought his parents to games before, there’s really no reason for her be this excited. This is actually getting worrisome.

Now’s not the time or place for that accusation though, so Andrew watches Ryan skate, and take shots, and stretch.

They only played together for one season, but Andrew paid extremely close attention that entire season, so he knows Ryan’s pre-game rituals. He can tell from how Ryan skates and stretches how he’s feeling and where he’s sore. He can tell that Ryan is excited about the game and that his left hamstring is tight, but not so tight it won’t loosen up once he’s skated. In the midst of a game, Ryan won’t feel anything wrong anyway. Andrew’s never met a person so willing to put up with pain just so he can get back to playing, and Andrew’s met a lot of hockey players.

He glances over at the Kings to gauge how they’re feeling tonight. Quick is in net, taking shots from his teammates. Andrew and Ryan played against him a bunch, back in college. Andrew grins. He scored two on Quick in one period in his sophomore year. That was a good game.

He doesn’t know if Ryan will check his phone between warmups and the game, but he texts him all the weak spots he can remember about Quick. Not like the ‘Nucks scouting staff won’t have said the same thing, but it never hurts to say it again.

It’s a tight game and fun to watch. His parents cheer loudly and unabashedly for the Canucks and Ryan, which makes Andrew smile, because it’s the exact way they used to cheer for him growing up. Probably the way they still do cheer for him, but now he can’t see it.

During second intermission, a kid recognizes him as he’s coming back from the bathroom and asks for his autograph. It doesn’t happen to Andrew very often, and it still gives him a thrill. The kid can’t be more than 13 and wants to play for Delta when he can, so Andrew chats about juniors and college and tells the kid good luck. He loves Raleigh, but sometimes it’s really good to be back in Vancouver.

The Canucks break the tie with two quick goals in the the last 10 minutes of the third period, and the Kings can’t get one back, not even with Quick pulled. He and his parents wait for the rush out of the arena to slow, and before they even leave their seats, he gets two quick text messages.

“Come on dude,” from Burrows.

“Wtf? He stole my phone. You don’t have to come,” from Ryan.

“Of course I want to come,” he texts back.

“Ugh. Meet me at my car?”

Andrew looks around and the crowd has died down, so he and his parents make his way out their seats and the arena.

“I think I’m gonna go out with Ryan and some of the guys,” he says casually as they walk to the the players’ lot. His mom frowns and his dad’s brows furrow.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea, honey?” his mom asks. “You aren’t really supposed to be drinking.”

“Ryan will be there,” Andrew says. “And I haven’t had a chance to go out and have fun in forever. I won’t get too crazy or anything. And plus, I still haven’t seen Ryan’s apartment here.”

“Well,” his dad says, “I’m sure Ryan won’t let you do anything stupid.” He says this as if Ryan has never done anything stupid in his life. Andrew has the urge to tell them in excruciating detail how Ryan got a black eye doing keg stands in college, but it probably won’t help his cause, so he doesn’t.

When they get to Ryan’s car, Burrows and Kevin Bieksa are there too, leaning against the hood and talking to Ryan.

Andrew’s mom hugs Ryan and tells him what a good job he did, much to the amusement of Burrows and Bieksa.

“Got a little competition there?” Bieksa asks. Andrew can’t say, “She’s decided he’s her son-in-law already,” so he just settles for making a pained face, and Bieksa laughs. Ryan gives them both the finger where he thinks Andrew’s mom can’t see.

“Andrew’s not supposed to drink on his medications,” his mom is saying.

“I know,” Ryan says. “I’m driving, so I won’t be drinking much either. And then we’ll just crash at my place.”

“Hello,” Andrew says, “I’m right here, and I can take care of myself.”

“Of course you can, honey,” his mom says. Ryan just gives him a disbelieving look.

“So I hear your stomach exploded or something,” Bieksa says.

“That’s about right,” Andrew shrugs. “Emergency appendectomy.”

“Sucks.”

“Yup.”

“Alright, losers, let’s go,” Ryan says.

Andrew says goodbye to his parents and gets in Ryan’s car. Burrows and Bieksa go for the back seat, but Ryan stops them.

“Juice, you puke in my car again and you won’t survive the night. Take Bur’s car.”

“Subtle, Kes,” Andrew snorts.

“Bieksa won’t notice,” Ryan says as he peels out of the lot a little faster than is probably safe. Burrows’ car hasn’t even turned on when they round a corner and out of view. “I say that to him every time. Besides, if we get there fast enough, we can get in a good five minutes in the back seat.”

“Just don’t kill us before we get there,” Andrew says.

Ryan glances over at him, then back at the road. “You sure you’re okay with this?”

“What? Yes. Why wouldn’t I be okay with this? It’s awesome. It’s the first time I’ve had a chance to go out and have fun since my birthday.”

“You can’t get as drunk as you did that night on your medication.”

“Yeah, thanks, I know that, Mom. And don’t talk like you didn’t enjoy me being that wasted.”

Andrew can’t quite tell, because it’s dark, but he thinks Ryan is blushing. The phone sex that night was pretty epic.

“That’s it,” Ryan says, changing the subject. He turns onto a darker side street and parks. Andrew leans over and kisses him before he can say anything.

“Mmm, back seat,” Ryan says after a minute.

Andrew goes to climb over the seat and Ryan glares at him. “Oh fine,” Andrew says, gets out, and goes around that way. He lets Ryan gets settled, then climbs onto his lap. His head brushes the ceiling but it’s not too uncomfortable. Andrew likes Ryan’s car. So roomy.

“We could just skip this and go back to my place,” Ryan says after a few minutes. His thumbs are rubbing circles into Andrew’s hips, and he really just wants to say yes, but…

“That would be a little suspicious,” he says instead. Ryan sighs.

“We better go in now, then.”

Andrew climbs reluctantly off Ryan’s lap and out of the car. He takes a few deep breaths of cold air, trying to tell his body to hold off for a few hours.

The bar isn’t fancy or big, but it’s clear that Ryan’s familiar with it, and the bartenders recognize him, give him a wave, and point to a table in the back. Burrows and Bieksa are already there with a pitcher and four glasses.

“You get lost, Kes?” Burrows asks.

“Parking,” Ryan shrugs, and sits.

Andrew sits next to him, and Bieksa’s already pouring him a glass and sliding it across the table. Excellent. He’d been underage in Raleigh until a few days before his surgery. It’s awesome to be able to just sit down and have a beer without worrying if someone’s gonna bust the bar for serving it to him.

He takes a long drink and catches Ryan giving him a look. He smiles back, because Ryan can’t say anything here, in front of Burrows and Bieksa. Not if he doesn’t want it to seem weird.

Ryan rolls his eyes at him and takes a long sip of his own beer. Burrows and Bieksa start talking again, taking up the conversation they’d been having before Andrew and Ryan showed up.

An hour later Andrew’s finished his beer and moved on to water, to the derision of Burrows and Bieksa. Ryan’s only on his second and nursing it. Burrows and Bieksa have finished off another pitcher and a half between them, and Andrew’s pretty sure they’re going to have to call a taxi for them before they leave.

Burrows has Ryan engaged in a detailed conversation about … something complicated. Andrew can’t quite get the finer points, but it sounds like it has something to do with riling up the Flames for their next game.

Bieksa leans over, his head propped on his hand, like he can’t be assed to hold it up himself.

“It’s kinda weird though,” he says.

Andrew raises his eyebrows. “What is?”

“Kes and…” he waves his other hand, “you.”

Andrew goes very still and tries not to show it. “How so?”

“You’re like, friends and shit.”

Andrew lets out the breath he was holding and smiles. “Yeah, Bieksa. We’re friends.”

“No, but he like, likes you and stuff. Like, actually likes you.”

“Yeah, that’s generally the definition of friends,” Andrew points out after he’s parsed what that sentence actually means.

Bieksa shakes his head. “Not with Kes, man. With Kes it’s like … I dunno. But he like, does things for you. Nice things.” Bieksa’s eyes narrow. “He doesn’t do nice things for me.”

Andrew stifles a laugh and kicks Ryan’s ankle under the table. “Sometimes,” he says.

“Does he have a thing for your mom? It’s okay, you can tell me.”

“No, Juice, I wouldn’t cheat on your mom that way,” Ryan interjects.

“Hey!” Bieksa says, and Burrows laughs.

“Jesus,” Ryan says, “I can’t take you two anywhere.”

“I can’t take your face anywhere,” Bieksa replies.

“Okay, I think it’s time for that cab,” Ryan says. He downs the last of his beer and gets up from the tables, gesturing for Andrew to do the same.

“Hey, aren’t you gonna pay your share?” Burrows asks.

“You guys wanted to hang with Laddy, you can treat,” Ryan says, and walks off. Andrew follows, trying to suppress his laughter at the look on Burrows’ face.

Ryan stops at the bar and arranges for the bartender to call his teammates a cab, then slips him a twenty, “just in case those losers forget to tip.”

The bartender smiles and pats Ryan on the shoulder.

“People here like you,” Andrew says when they get back in the car.

“Yes, I play on the Canucks. Duh.”

“Well yeah, that, and you’re like, charming and stuff.”

Ryan glances at him. “I thought I wasn’t charming enough to make people do things for me?”

He doesn’t sound mad or anything, but Andrew fights the urge to duck his head and apologize. “Charming when you want to be,” he says. “I have no idea when you learned to do that.”

“In college,” Ryan says. “From Jack.” He stares at the road for a solid minute, then ruins it all by laughing.

“I’m sorry, did I say you were charming? That must be the beer,” Andrew says, but he’s laughing too.

Ryan’s apartment is nice, but bland and mostly empty. It’s pretty much the Vancouver equivalent of Andrew’s apartment in Raleigh. Probably, if he looked in the fridge, he would find nothing but Gatorade and old take-out here, too.

Normally, as rookies, they’d live with another rookie or with an older teammate for the first season, but Ryan and Andrew had decided pretty quickly that they were getting their own places, because the privacy it’ll afford them on the one or two nights a year they need it is more valuable than company. Tonight’s the first night they’ll get to put that to good use.

Ryan backs Andrew gently, but firmly up against the door and kisses him. “Do you want the tour?” he asks.

“Only if the first and last stop is your bedroom.”

“That’s the only interesting part, anyway,” Ryan says, and kisses Andrew again.

___

Andrew wakes up to Ryan wrapped around him and nothing else. No alarms going off, no having to sneak out so no one will find them, no parents in the next room. It’s kind of amazing.

“How long do you have to stay in Michigan this summer?” Andrew asks quietly. Ryan doesn’t stop rubbing his thumb across Andrew’s bare hip.

“Depends,” he says. “I’ll come back here to start training, I think. So, end of June, unless…”

Ryan won’t say it, but Andrew knows he means unless there’s a parade.

“I’m gonna train here too,” Andrew says.

“Okay,” Ryan says, and Andrew can feel his smile on the back of his neck.

___

Andrew spends the next day in a horrible mood. He wakes up, alone, in his bed, first of all. And Ryan will go home to Michigan tomorrow, and then Andrew won’t see him until the season is over and they’re both back in BC.

He slumps at the kitchen table, drinking coffee and wishing that his appendix hadn’t decided to burst. He was fine with the way things were until he got a taste of what it would be like to have Ryan around all the time. He also kind of wishes he never spent the night in Ryan’s apartment. It was like a tease. A really mean tease.

He snaps at his mom when she suggests he do something with his day, then decides to go work out so that he doesn’t make his entire family mad at him the day before Christmas Eve.

He’s allowed to lift light weights now, but he overdoes it a bit and has to limp back up to his room without anyone seeing him. He spends a long time in a hot shower, telling himself to suck it up and deal. He decides he’ll take a long nap when he’s done and just sleep until his aunt and uncle get here and it’s time for dinner.

When he walks into his room though, Ryan is on his bed, using his laptop.

Andrew blinks.

“Hey,” Ryan says. He types something on the computer. “Jane says hi.”

“Tell her I said hi back,” Andrew says automatically. “What are you doing here?”

Ryan shrugs. “No practice today, just a team meeting. And your mom said I could leave my car here while I’m in Michigan, so you have to drive me to the airport tomorrow morning.”

“Oh,” Andrew says. “Okay. Call of Duty?”

“Sure,” Ryan says, types something else, presumably saying goodbye to Jane, then closes the laptop.

“Cool,” Andrew says. “Let me get dressed.”

___

Ryan only looks mildly pained while having dinner with Andrew’s mom and dad and aunt and uncle. Not like he needs to worry, because his uncle, is of course, a huge Canucks fan. He keeps giving Andrew approving looks, like Andrew started dating a Canuck on purpose.

Andrew fidgets through watching an old Christmas movie that he doesn’t pay attention to, then claims having to get up early to take Ryan to the airport and drags Ryan upstairs with him.

He locks the door and presses Ryan into the bed. Ryan is making a face.

“What?” Andrew asks.

“Your entire family knows we’re up here having sex,” Ryan says.

“They’ll live,” Andrew says. Then he kisses Ryan so he can’t talk anymore.

He has a few twinges from working out earlier, but he ignores them because he’s wanted to do this for weeks. Months.

He undoes Ryan’s fly and shucks his jeans and boxers off quickly. He doesn’t even bother taking off Ryan’s shirt - just pushes it up to his armpits and licks his nipples.

“Ah!” Ryan gasps, then snaps his mouth shut. Andrew grins into Ryan’s skin and hands him another pillow without looking up from what he’s doing. Ryan grabs it from his hand and covers his face. Andrew goes back to paying attention to Ryan’s body.

He makes his way down Ryan’s chest slowly, then skips over his crotch completely and starts on his thighs.

“Oh, fuck you,” Ryan says into the pillow.

He works his way down to Ryan’s knees, then back up, and then finally starts on Ryan’s cock. He takes his time, drawing it out. He brings Ryan to the edge once, then backs off, as Ryan curses him into the pillow. Andrew’s jaw is starting to ache and he doesn’t care. He puts two fingers in his mouth alongside Ryan’s dick and sucks on them too for a while before he moves them back to Ryan’s ass. Ryan lifts his hips, wanting it, and finally Andrew stops teasing and pushes them inside. He starts sucking hard, and that’s it for Ryan.

“Are you alive?” Andrew asks, lifting the pillow off Ryan’s face.

“Holy shit,” Ryan says.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Andrew says, sprawling on top of Ryan and ignoring his own erection for now. “I’ve been wanting to do that for a while.”

“No kidding,” Ryan says. “Just gimme a minute.”

“Take your time,” Andrew says, not bothering to keep the smug out of his voice. He moves his hips so his dick rubs against the hollow of Ryan’s hip. “Not too much time though.”

“Have I ever told you that smugness isn’t attractive?”

“No, never,” Andrew deadpans, and hitches his hips again. Then he does it again, because it feels really really good.

“Having fun?” Ryan asks.

“Mmm, yeah,” Andrew says. “Feel free to join in at any time.”

“I wouldn’t want to spoil it.”

“Ryan,” Andrew says, except it comes out more like a whine.

“Oh well, when you put it that way,” Ryan says, and reaches down, and wraps his hand around Andrew’s cock.

___

When the alarm goes off at a ridiculously early hour of the morning, Andrew’s face is smushed against Ryan’s shoulder, and and he’s drooling.

“Gross, dude.” Ryan mumbles.

“Whatever,” Andrew says, turns over, and pulls the cover up to his chin.

He’s almost managed to fall back to sleep when Ryan says, “Andrew, I have to go to the airport.”

“No,” Andrew says. “Sleep.” It’s childish, maybe, but Andrew’s pretty sure right then that if he can convince Ryan to go back to sleep, he won’t have to leave.

“Andrew,” Ryan says, and he sounds really sad. Dammit. Andrew opens his eyes all the way.

“Fine,” he says, and sits up.

They get dressed, and brush their teeth, and Ryan throws the last of his things in his duffel.

“Ready,” he says.

“Okay,” Andrew says. “Let’s go.”

His mom is in a robe in the kitchen and has two cups of coffee in travel mugs ready for them.

“Have a safe flight, Ryan,” she says, and hugs him.

“Thanks for everything, Kim,” Ryan says, hugging her back. He doesn’t even look awkward about it. Clearly, he’s grown as a person.

They take Ryan’s car, and Ryan drives. Somewhere behind all the clouds, the sun starts to rise, lightening the gray. This sucks, Andrew thinks, and drinks more coffee. Usually when he has to say goodbye to Ryan it’s because the season is starting, and then there’s enough excitement and nervousness that it’s not as bad. This just sucks. He tries to remind himself that in 2 days he gets to go back to Raleigh and hockey. That does help, a little.

When they get on the highway, Ryan reaches over and rests one hand on Andrew’s thigh. Andrew puts his own on top and they stay like that until they get to the airport and Ryan needs both hands to drive.

He pulls into short term parking and finds a space toward the back, with no other cars around. As soon as he turns off the car, Andrew tugs on the collar of his shirt and kisses him

“All Star weekend,” Ryan says into Andrew’s lips.

“Huh?”

“It’s in a month,” Ryan says. It takes a moment for Andrew’s brain to switch gears, but then he gets it. The chances of either of them being an All Star are slim. And that’s an entire weekend without team obligations.

“Yeah, okay, where do you wanna meet?”

“We can figure it out later,” Ryan says and starts kissing Andrew again.

They kiss until Ryan very well might miss his flight if he doesn’t leave right the fuck now. Andrew tightens his hand in Ryan’s hair until it must be painful and then lets go.

“Don’t get hijacked, or whatever,” he says.

“I’ll try,” Ryan says seriously.

Andrew buckles himself into the driver’s seat and starts the car. Ryan leans back into the window.

“Merry Christmas,” he says, pecks Andrew on the lips one last time, and walks away.

“Merry Christmas,” Andrew says to the steering wheel.

He watches until Ryan disappears around a corner, then sits for another minute, his fingers gripping the steering wheel until his knuckles turn white and his hands start to ache. He lets go, takes a deep breath, and puts the car into drive.

Hockey in two days, he reminds himself. And in a month, Ryan.

Andrew flips on the radio, turns out of the airport, and goes home.

Hide It Well by shoemaster

Series: Extra Curriculars [4]
Fandoms: Hockey RPF
AO3 Categories: F/M, M/M
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Brent Seabrook/Original Female Character, Duncan Keith/Brent Seabrook
Characters: Brent Seabrook, Duncan Keith, Patrick Sharp, Ryan Kesler
Freeform Tags: Alternate Universe, Voyeurism
Status: Completed
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Published: 2011-08-16
Updated: 2011-08-16
Packaged: 2023-12-04 17:15:01
Summary:

“Hey Duncs,” Seabs says, not bothering to hold out his hand. “Long time, no see.”

Just over a year, Duncan thinks, but he doesn’t say it out loud. Seabs probably wouldn’t appreciate him bringing that up.

Hide It Well

Author’s Note:

The last part in the high school au-verse that wasn’t even supposed to be a real fic. A million thanks to beatperfume and riadsala for all their help and encouragement. Scads of OCs scattered through here, due to complete lack of planning in the first part.

“Nobody wants to act like they care too much. You hide it well.” -Ha Ha Tonka

Duncan spends the trade deadline on a bus to Grand Rapids, not parked in front of a TV showing TSN, so he’s a little out of the loop.

Half the guys are following the action on their phones and texting buddies on different teams, but Duncs just tries to rest up, because they’ve got a game in a few hours and he played over twenty minutes the night before.

Word of the trade comes around right before they get to the arena and the bus nearly erupts with noise. “Powie’s going to the Mighty Ducks-”

“Fuck you, that’s not their name anymore.”

“Whatever, the point is we’ll miss you, Powell.”

They will. He’s leading all the defensemen in assists and is huge on the power play. And he’s a fun guy to have around.

Duncan doesn’t get a chance to digest the rest of the details of the trade because Coach sends him over to talk with Peters who’s waiting with a whiteboard. He’ll be filling in on the power play for now. He’s excited for more ice time and a chance to show off a little more versatility.

When they get back to Rockford he expects a call up from Toledo to join them and shore up the roster. So it’s something of a surprise when he walks into the locker room and sees Seabs standing there shaking hands with Duncan’s teammates.

He knew Seabs was in Syracuse, he was right there when the Ducks draft him, but he never thought- never even considered that he might be part of the trade.

Micks turns to Duncan, leading the introductions like a good captain.“Oh, Seabs this is-”

“Hey Duncs,” Seabs says, not bothering to hold out his hand. “Long time, no see.”

Just over a year, Duncan thinks, but he doesn’t say it out loud. Seabs probably wouldn’t appreciate him bringing that up.

“Oh, you two know each other? That’s awesome.”

“We used to play against each other,” Seabs shrugs. He makes it sound so simple.

“Coach’ll be glad, if you two know each other’s games some,” Micks says. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to the rest of the guys.”

Seabs nods and brushes past Duncs without even touching him. Which is fine, totally fine, that’s the way it should be.

That’s what he tries to tell himself, at least, as he sinks down on to the bench in front of his locker and just stares at his equipment.

Once he gets over the shock, practice goes well enough. It’s hockey, and Duncan can always do hockey, even if Seabs is leaning against the boards watching him. But he can’t tell if Seabs is watching Duncs or just another teammate.

It’s a little nerve wracking.

He showers and changes quickly, trying to avoid getting dragged into conversation, especially with Seabs.

“Yo, Keith, we’re gonna go grab some food,” Sonny says. “You coming?”

“Raincheck,” Duncan says as he grabs his bag. “I’m wiped.”

He sneaks a glance a Seabs, but his face is unreadable. Duncan frowns to himself as he heads out to his truck.

He calls Sharpy the second the door to his apartment is locked behind him.

“I was wondering when you’d be calling,” Sharpy says as soon as he picks up.

“You knew?” Duncan says. “Why the fuck didn’t you warn me?”

“Warn you? I figured you’d be up to date on your own team news,” he pauses. “Did you really not know?”

“No, I mean, I knew there was a trade but the coaches kept me busy with my new role on the power play and I missed out on all the details.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah, so I get to practice today and there he is, and Richie introduced us-” Sharpy tries to muffle a snort “-and Seabs played it totally cool, like he didn’t even care.”

For someone who objected so strongly to getting dumped, he didn’t seem to care at all.

“He knew he was going to be seeing you,” Sharpy points out. “He had time to get his game face on. And now you can get yours on, you’ll be okay.”

Duncan sighs. Sharpy’s right, but he still doesn’t know what he did to deserve this. All he ever wanted was what was best for Seabs.

“He looked really good,” he adds quietly, barely able to make eye contact with the popcorn ceiling of his living room. Even after all the insane travel it had to have taken to get from Syracuse to Rockford, Seabs looked really good. And maybe he put on a few pounds of muscle since- since World Juniors.

“Oh sh- Are you going to be okay?” Sharpy asks. “I mean, really?”

“I’ll be fine,” Duncan says. “Game face.”

Duncs makes it through the next few practices with his game face on. If the other Hogs notice that he’s a little quieter than usual, no one mentions it. He’s friends with them, but he knows he’s earned a little bit of a weirdo rep. Only the goalies get away with more.

But after Brent’s first game - a win over Peoria, where he almost got into a fight - Richie announces that they’re all going out to dinner to celebrate.

Some guys beg off, but Snell’s giving Duncs a look so he agrees, even as Micks is offering Seabs a ride, since he’s not totally solid on his way around Rockford after less than a week.

Micks sees Duncan glancing over and says, “You want to hop in, too?”

“Nah,” Duncan says. “Gotta swing by CVS on my way home.”

He could probably use more toilet paper, so it’s not a lie.

Driving himself means he’s one of the last to arrive though, and Micks has saved him a seat. Which would be great, except it’s right across from Seabs.

It’s not that big of a deal, there’s nothing special about sitting together in a restaurant with twelve other guys. It’s not that different than sitting in the locker room, or when they’re going to have to bus up to Milwaukee in a few days.

It’s fine. Duncan doesn’t even notice that Seabs still wants his burger toppings on the side.

There is one awkward thing, when his plate comes with a pickle spear on it, and he goes to move it to Brent’s plate without thinking.

He catches himself halfway across the table though, and Seabs glances up at him, his eyes unreadable.

“Um, do you?” Duncs asks.

“Yeah, sure,” Seabs says and Duncan can finally put it down and wipe his hand off on his napkin.

He might see Seabs quirk a little smile, but it’s not really that well lit in here.

“Wait, you two went to high school together?” Jeff asks as Duncs is picking through his food.

“Only for a couple years,” Duncan says. He’d liked the second year a lot more than the first, but now he’s not so sure.

“Oh man,” Micks says throwing an arm around Duncs. “Seabs, what was this guy like back then?”

“He called me angry bubble boy,” Duncan cuts in. He’d rather embarrass himself than leave it open for Seabs.

The table cracks up, because of course no one has anything better to talk about right now. “Oh god, I bet,” Richie says.

“You wouldn’t play for the Vipers,” Seabs shrugs. And he’s doing that thing where he’s nicer to Duncan than Duncan ever expects him to be, and Duncs probably won’t handle it any better this time than he did last time.

But then Seabs continues, “and he even had a high school sweetheart.” That draws a smattering of coos and disbelief from the guys around them, but Duncan freezes as Seabs stares him down. “Of course then he blew it all up in college saying he loved hockey more.”

Seabs looks away then and grabs Mick’s beer draining it while Snell slaps Duncan on the back. “Stone cold, Duncs. Stone cold.”

“I didn’t,” he tries to protest. “I never said that.”

But no one’s listening to him.

He doesn’t even realize until later, when he’s alone in his apartment staring at the ceiling and debating calling Sharpy or maybe his sister, how well Seabs side stepped the pronoun issue.

He’d always been good at that.

Duncan worries that practice might be awkward after what happened at dinner, and if it is, it’s Seabs’s fault. Not that it’ll matter whose fault it is if the team chemistry gets fucked with.

But considering the way things went down before, and how more than half of the greater Vancouver area took Seabs’s side, the cold comfort is still a comfort.

It turns out not to be an issue at all though, which is a relief, but Duncan is still jittery waiting for Seabs to say or do something in the locker room.

Hitting the ice loosens him up a bit, and he doesn’t even mind when the D pairs are mixed up and he ends up with Seabs. It’s just a few minutes, and it’s not like either of them were unprepared for this possibility, so it’s fine. They’re professionals, and stymie Micks and Snell as they try to take the puck past them.

Coach looks on approvingly and no one suspects that there’s anything else going on between Duncs and Seabs.

Because nothing is.

The next game is in Milwaukee, it barely counts as a road trip, they won’t even be staying overnight in the city. So Seabs is going to have to wait til the western Canada trip before he learns why Connors was the one without a roommate.

The game goes well enough, even during the second period when Duncan can’t get off the ice for a line change because the Admirals are forechecking hard and he’s alone on the ice. Suddenly Seabs is out there, turning the two on one into a two on two. Duncs is able to get the puck over into the corner, but it’s another twenty seconds before their forwards can get the puck through the neutral zone so he has enough time and space to change.

“Good work,” Coach says as Duncan grabs for his Gatorade.

So it’s not much of a surprise when he puts Seabs out with Duncan intentionally before the period draws to a close.  It’s not a big deal, this is what they do and Seabs is a good player, they’ll be fine.

They do better than fine, actually, because Seabs absolutely crushes the puck carrier against the boards and chips the puck over to Duncs. He’s free to carry the puck out of the zone an send it up to Micks who pulls a few fancy deke moves before scoring high glove side.

They all crash in on Micks slapping him on the head and hugging. Seabs stays on Micks’s other side

Most everyone sleeps on the ride back to Rockford, and Duncan settles into his usual spot towards the back of the bus. When he leans his head against the window, pillowing his hoodie underneath his head he can see Seabs’s reflection in the glass a few rows up. The bus is quiet, save the occasional snuffling and snoring from the guys.

With a little effort, Dunc can pick out the rhythm of Seabs’s snoring separate and distinct from Connors and Hayes. It shouldn’t be as comforting as it is, but it reminds him of weekends spent in extra long twin beds. He falls asleep thinking of long road trips from Michigan to BC.

They play more together after Milwaukee, in practice and in games and it’s good, sometimes great. And it gets easier to pretend that this is all they are. That all they ever were was classmates, and occasional opponents and now teammates.

Duncan knows Seabs is fitting in well with the team when he calls Nordy “sugar” and Sonny “honeypie” while they’re getting changed one afternoon and everyone just laughs at the nicknames. No one even raises an eyebrow. Why would they? Seabs is straight now, and his fondness for pet names isn’t nearly as weird as his pregame routine.

A few weeks later they’re playing Peoria again, on a Wednesday night and it’s another scrum fest from buzzer to buzzer. Seabs mixes it up with the Rivermen goons more than Duncan does, using his size to protect the smaller guys. He handles himself really well without ever having to drop the gloves. The scouts should be impressed; Duncan is.

On top of all that, Dunc is able to set Seabs up for a goal during one of the three 4-on-4s in the third period. It’s not the game winner or anything, just piling on to make the lead 5-1, but that doesn’t make it any less awesome.

When they get to the bar after the game, Seabs obviously agrees. “I owe you a beer,” he says as they settle in around a group of tables.

“It’s not a big deal,” Duncs says. Mostly he’s just enjoying Seabs smiling at him.

“My first goal as an Icehog? It’s a big deal,” Seabs says waving him off.

“Let the man buy you a beer, Keith,” Hayes says, throwing an arm over his shoulder.

“Fine, fine,” Duncan says. “Since I broke his scoring drought and all.”

He tries not to think about other definitions of scoring drought while Seabs leans over to the waitress. “Get this guy a Newcastle.”

“Newcastle?” Nordy asks, raising an eyebrow. “Wow, you really rate.”

Duncan just likes it better than most of the standard stuff they have on tap at American bars, and Seabs has heard him bitch about it enough that he didn’t need to ask what Dunc wanted. But Seabs looks a little flushed, since someone’s pointed it out.

“Five bucks for a beer instead of three,” Duncan deadpans. “He’s a real big spender.”

“Yeah, Nordy,” Micks cuts in. “Not everyone’s as cheap as you.”

Duncan and Seabs both laugh, and god, it feels so good to just have things be easy between them and not tense, like Andrew Ladd goes going to emerge from the shadows and break Duncan’s jaw if he says the wrong thing.

It’s a good night with the guys just drinking, shooting the shit and taking turns playing darts or pool. At some point Dunc loses track of Seabs, but he doesn’t really think anything of it.

Not until he’s pushing his way through the crowd to the bathroom and nearly trips over Seabs and his…new friend. The blonde with curly hair who’d been sitting at the bar when the team came in, disengages from the kiss.

“Oh, uh, sorry,” Duncan stammers out. Seabs’s lips are redder than usual, redder than they should be even if- oh right, she’s wearing red lipstick.

Seabs looks surprised at least. “Oh, uh. Sorry about that.”

Duncan coughs. “No problem, I just need to-”

“Right, yeah,” Seabs says stepping out of the way.

The bathroom door doesn’t shut fast enough for Duncan not to hear a soft, “Why don’t we go somewhere a little more private? My roommate is over at her boyfriend’s tonight.”

Dunc spends about five minutes washing his hands, giving them plenty of time to clear out so he doesn’t have to deal with that again.

He’s not going to pretend he’s not jealous – he allows himself one pity shot – it’s Seabs and Duncan didn’t actually want to break up with him, if there had been some way…. But it was impossible. It’s better this way.

Better for Seabs, with all the guys talking about how hot that girl was, and nobody thinking it’s weird that he’s driving two hours to a rival school on his days off. Nobody wonders about Seabs at all. It’s what Dunc wanted for him, so being really upset about seeing it in action would be stupid.

Not that he planned on seeing Seabs move on quite that up close and personal. He was supposed to be in Syracuse or Anaheim. Not Rockford.

“You okay there, Keith?” Snell asks, sitting next to him at the bar.

“Can’t complain.”

“Really? You look like someone cut all your sticks too short.”

“Just a little tired,” he lies. “Think I might bail.”

“Micks is heading out soon, he can give you a ride,” Snell says, clapping him on the shoulder, instead of giving him shit about wanting to leave early.

He must look really bad, which is a problem. He’ll need to fix that before the next practice, but tomorrow is a day off, so there’s plenty of time for that.

“He probably did it on purpose,” Sharpy says the next day.

Duncan frowns. “I don’t think so. He looked surprised and he wouldn’t. I mean… It’s been a year and he’s obviously over it.”

That draws a snort from the other end of the line. “I would, and none of my exes… It was a dick move.”

“He’s allowed to get laid,” Duncan points out. “I don’t get to care anymore. I gave that up.”

“This phone call is you not caring?”

“I’m trying.”

“Yeah, well you just have to keep it up for a couple more weeks, then it’s back home and all that forced interaction ends.”

“Until next season.”

“You need a break,” Sharpy says. “I need a break from hearing about this shit. Me and the guys’ll take care of you, don’t worry.”

Seabs is watching Duncan all through practice the next day, but he pretends not to notice. He doesn’t know why Seabs is watching him, or what he expects Duncs to say or do. There’s nothing to say, and the only thing to do is play hockey.

Not that the games actually matter at this point, since they’re not making the playoffs. Normally Duncan would feel bad about how relieved he feels at the end of the season approaching. He hates losing, but Rockford is feeling too small these days and he misses the people that know him best.

They win their last game, at least, to go out on a high note and then it’s time to clean out their lockers and pack up their apartments.

It’s easier to fit all his stuff in the back of his SUV now that he’s driving home alone, but the trip will take longer with just one driver.

At least he’ll be able to pick the music the whole way.

It takes Duncan three days to make the drive back home, and he sleeps for another three days once he gets there, emerging only occasionally for food and water.

“You reek,” Rebecca says when he finally stays in the kitchen for more than fifteen minutes at a time.

He shrugs and she rolls her eyes.

“The Phantoms have been eliminated, but Sharpy’s up with the Flyers now, but they’re down 3-1 to the Habs, so he might be back soon.”

“Yeah?” he asks. His voice sounds weird, so he drinks more water.

“Yeah,” she says. “And oh, I ran into Seabs outside McNulty’s. That was awkward.”

Duncan frowns. “Why were you at a hockey bar?”

“We went to dinner across the street,” she says, rolling her eyes at him.

That’s a relief, especially since she isn’t actually old enough to get into a bar yet. “Was he uh, with anyone?”

The look she gives him tells Duncan just how subtle he isn’t. “Just some guys from Delta. Now seriously, go shower before the smell is transferred to the curtains and the kitchen stays like this all summer.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Duncs says before wrapping her in a big bear hug.

“You’re so gross, Duncan,” she says, slapping at his arms before finally giving in and hugging him back.

Over the next few days he finally unpacks his car - by himself, because Becky claims to have homework whenever he asks – and he goes for a drive.

He doesn’t have a real destination in mind, just wants to check out what’s changed around town. The problem of course, is that most things in Delta and half of Vancity remind him of Seabs, or Seabs and Ladd and everyone else from the Vipers.

So after a while he turns the car east and heads for Langley, and he’s practically on autopilot the whole trip down the TCH.

When he stops at the Timmy’s near the Lancers’ practice rink, he sits in a booth and watches groups of kids come in and tries not to feel too old.

“Duncs?” a voice asks from behind him while he’s watching a group of teenagers shove at each other in line.

“Hey Bobby,” Duncs says once he turns around. “What’s up, man?”

“Not much, man, just got done with school,” Bobby says. “How about you?”

“Just got back from the A, just hanging around.”

“I’m having a barbecue this weekend, you should come by, a ton of the Lancers are gonna be there,” Bobby says. “We can all catch up.”

Duncan grins, “That sounds awesome man, Sharpy should be back by then.”

“Fuck yeah,” Bobby says punching his arm. “It’s gonna be awesome. I gotta go meet my girl, but I’ll see you Saturday.”

“For sure,” Duncs says. It’ll be awesome, getting to see everyone.

Sharpy’s back in town on Thursday, and Duncan goes to visit him once he gets the word. Sure Sharpy’s drive was longer, but he hasn’t played a game in two weeks, so he shouldn’t be as tired.

“Miss me Duncs?” Sharpy asks, his grin wide and easy, even though he looks exhausted.

“Nah,” Duncan lies pulling him in for a quick slap on the back. “Just your parents’ movie collection.”

They don’t talk much, mostly because Sharpy falls asleep halfway through the movie and before he even finishes his first beer. But he should be more lively on Saturday, and Duncan is just glad for a few hours around someone he doesn’t have to hide things from, and doesn’t share his last name.

It’s a really nice day for a cookout on Saturday, and Bobby’s got a beer pong table set up in his back yard.

“I might be a little rusty,” Dunc warns Sharpy when they partner up. “I haven’t played since I left MSU.”

“Rockford can’t be that much more exciting than Glens Falls,” he snorts.

They do pretty well, sinking enough shots to get Bobby and Gordo drinking at least as often as he and Sharpy do. Duncan has a pretty good rhythm going, but it’s all thrown off when, right before his shot, he suddenly hears Andrew Ladd saying, “What the fuck is he doing here?”

The ping pong ball bounces way wide of the cups and ends up landing at Ryan’s feet. Of course he’s here with Ladd and Seabs.

At least it’s a friendly face. Not that Seabs is looking unfriendly, he’s just busy trying to distract Ladd.

“It’s a Lancers’ party, what did you expect?” Dunc snaps at Ladd as he takes the ball back from Ryan.

“Sorry, guys, I figured last year’s militarized zones were expired,” Bobby shrugs.

“It’s fine,” Seabs says. “Don’t worry about it.”

He shoots Duncan a tight smile, and he tries to answer it before finishing Sharpy’s beer for him.

Ryan and Seabs get Ladd over to a separate part of the yard, and Duncan tries to refocus on the beer pong game. He and Sharpy end up losing, but he doesn’t really mind, since it means he gets to finish off the cups.

“I’m getting another beer,” Duncan says once another pair takes over their place at the table.

Sharpy makes a face, but Duncan waves him off. “It’s fine, I’m not trying to get wasted.” He just doesn’t want to be sober.

“I’ll grab a couple burgers,” Sharpy says.

It’s probably a good idea, especially since Duncan has been drinking shitty American beer for the past eight months.

He heads to the cooler by the patio door and isn’t surprised when a shadow falls over him while he’s grabbing a couple of Molsons. It doesn’t come with any blows or insults, so he knows it’s not Ladd.

He sighs when he looks up and sees Ryan standing there with his shoulders stiff. “I guess I should be glad they sent you.”

“No one sent me,” Ryan shrugs. Duncan knows it’s true, because Ladd is glaring at both of them, while Seabs grips his arm solidly enough for Duncs to see from here. Seabs isn’t looking at them though, he’s just chatting with Joey like nothing weird is going on.

“So how’s it going, Dunc?” Ryan asks. “Haven’t heard from you in a while.”

Duncan shrugs, “Fine. How’s it going playing with the big boys?”

“Pretty good, you know. You gonna be getting in my way next season?”

“Depends on camp, I guess. Got a bit more competition now.”

“Seabs said you guys have been playing together some,” Ryan says, not bothering to talk around it.

“Some, yeah,” Duncan says.

“How’s that going?” Ryan presses, even though they’re right in front of all the beer and not everyone here knows he and Seabs were. Yeah.

“It’s fine,” Duncan says. “I’m fine. He could’ve told you that.”

He’s not really lying, but even though he’d gotten used to hanging out around Seabs with the team, it’s different and way weirder doing it around people who know what they used to be.

“I wanted to hear it from you,” Ryan says. “We should grab a beer later.”

“Yeah,” Duncan agrees. He likes Ryan, he does. Sometimes he gets Dunc more than Ladd or Seabs do. “I wouldn’t mention it to your boy though, he’s looking a little purple as it is.”

He’s shooting Duncan death glares, and Duncan has to wonder why he still cares that much. Seabs has moved on, so why hasn’t Ladd?

Ryan glances back at Ladd and rolls his eyes, but Duncan can see the smile tugging at his mouth. “Don’t worry about him, we’ll catch up later.”

“For sure,” Duncan says before taking his beer back to the retaining wall where Sharpy’s waiting with food.

“What’d Kesler have to say?” Sharpy asks as he passes Duncan his plain burger.

“Just saying hi,” Dunc shrugs.

Duncan finishes his burger and goes to talk with Harrison, because the guy’s been off in Sweden for the last year. He’s not avoiding Ladd, because this is his friend’s place, and these are his guys.

And Ryan and Seabs are doing a pretty good job of keeping him corralled.

He and Sharpy are by the cooler later, when Seabs comes out from inside the house, accidentally bumping Sharpy.

“Oh, sorry,” Seabs says automatically. He grins when he realizes it’s Sharpy. “How’s it going, pretty boy?”

Sharpy shoots Duncan a look before replying, and Duncan just shrugs at him. “Can’t complain.”

“So tell, me how are the press boxes in the NHL?” Seabs teases.

“Not bad,” Sharpy says. “Food’s better.”

“You ate it? Didn’t worry over your physique, since you weren’t getting any actual playing time?”

Sharpy rolls his eyes but Duncan can’t help a little grin, and Seabs catches his eye, wagging his eyebrows quickly. It’s nice sharing their friends again, Dunc isn’t going to go all Andrew Ladd on either of them.

“I was still practicing, dumb fuck. With a guy you might’ve heard of, oh, what’s his name again. Pronger something.”

The smug look falls off Seabs’s face quickly. “Did you talk to him at all? What’s he like?”

Duncan has to muffle a laugh, while Sharpy puffs up a little. “He was cool, did you want me to try to pass him a note for you at training camp? Get some pictures in the showers?”

Duncan has to laugh then, and Seabs smacks him on the shoulder. “Shut up, you’re just j-”

The easy mood falls away quickly as Seabs snatches his hand away. “I mean…”

“Yeah, I’m real jealous of his brittle bones,” Duncs says lamely, trying to break the awkward silence that is rapidly forming.

It’s close to what he used to say, but this time Seabs is shooting him a tense smile, not scoffing and tackling him, or kissing him to remind him which defenseman he actually had a chance in hell of blowing.

“I, uh, I’m going to go to the bathroom,” Duncan says abruptly, as Sharpy tries to fill the silence.

“Yeah, I should uh, go,” Seabs says jerking his head in Ladd and Ryan’s general direction.

“See ya,” Duncan says, trying not to rip the sliding glass door off it’s tracks.

It’s sad, that this could be considered a high point for them.

“Smooth,” Sharpy says, when he finds him outside.

“Fuck off,” Duncan sighs.

“You ready to go?” Sharpy asks.

“You sure?”

“I’ve heard all the interesting stories,” Sharpy shrugs. “And all the good beer is gone.”

It’s a lie, but Duncan appreciates it.

Duncan doesn’t run into Seabs much over the next couple of months. He’s not actively avoiding him or anything, but they do have different friends and places they like to hang out.

Ryan follows through on their plans to grab a beer. It’s only a little awkward when half of his stories involve something about Ladd or hanging out with Seabs. But he’s got good stories about bouncing back and forth between the A and the big leagues.

“So, are you seeing anybody?” he asks as they’re finishing up their food.

Duncan stares at him, because he would’ve thought that was obvious. “No. Just…focusing on hockey.”

Kes starts giving him that sad twist of a smile, so Duncan follows it up with, “And Rockford doesn’t have much of a club scene.”

Ryan laughs. “I bet. But hey, maybe when you get to Chicago, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Duncan says. “We’ll see.”

“Seabs says you guys have prospect camp soon.”

“Next weekend. Should be fun.”

“Try not to scare the newbies, Dunc.”

He shouldn’t be surprised to run into Seabs at the gate for his flight back to Chicago, but for some reason he is. He hesitates for a minute before dropping into the seat across from him.

“Oh, hey,” Seabs says, pulling off his headphones. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“Yeah,” Duncan says. “Should’ve realized…”

Seabs just shrugs. “I didn’t even consider it, but hey, we can split a cab to the hotel.”

“Yeah,” Duncan agrees. He hopes rooms are already assigned, and it’s not determined by who you show up with. “So um, how’s your summer going?”

“Good, you know, training with Ladd and Kes. Keith just got drafted.”

“I heard,” Duncan says. “The Flames, yeah?”

“Yeah. He’s being obnoxious about it, but that’s not really a surprise.”

Duncan grins, because he remembers what Seabs had been like when he went in the first round their year. “Wonder where he gets that from.”

“Don’t be a dick,” Seabs says, kicking Duncan’s foot. “But uh, speaking of. Sorry about the whole cookout thing. I know it got kind of weird-”

“It’s fine,” Duncan says quickly. “Seriously, don’t worry about it. Kes already apologized for the stick up Ladd’s ass.”

“Yeah, sorry. He’s…weird. But we’re good, right?”

“Definitely,” Duncan says as firmly as he can.

“It’ll be good to see the guys,” Seabs says, changing the subject.

“And actually play,” Duncan agrees. “Even if it’s just scrimmages.”

“Gotta impress the brass.”

They’re on the same flight together again a few months later for training camp, and Seabs swears they even have the same flight attendants. At least it’s less awkward hanging around the airport with him, both of them too excited for camp to care too much about the old days.

“You nervous?” Seabs asks as they wait at baggage claim in O’Hare.

“Nah,” Duncs says. “Did okay in prospect camp.”

Even though, or maybe because he spent more than half the time partnered with Seabs. He’s not sure if that will happen again now that they’ll have the regulars to mix and match with.

Honestly though, he doesn’t care, as long as he makes the team. Besides, it’s just practice and games, they can handle that much. They’ll probably have to handle it in Rockford, so they might as well do it in Chicago.

“Well I hope you rub off on me,” Seabs says. His eyes widen when he realizes what he’s said. “Oh, I think I see my bag.”

So that was weird, but they’ll get to the hotel soon and the other guys will be there.

Except when they finally get to the hotel to check in, the desk clerk hands them both keys and says, “Room 804.”

“Wait, both of us?” Duncs asks.

“Yes sir, Mr. Keith, is there a problem?”

“Um, no,” Duncan says. “Thank you.”

Seabs doesn’t say anything while they head to the elevator, and they run into Micks almost the second they get off the elevator.

“Hey!” he says patting them both on the shoulder. “What room?”

“804,” Seabs says and Duncan just nods.

“Both of you? They’re not being subtle with the blue line matchmaking, are they?” he laughs.

“Uh. Guess not,” Duncan says. “We’ve gotta put our stuff away…”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m in 819, we’re going for dinner in a bit.”

“Sounds good,” Seabs nods as he begins heading down the hall. Duncan has to hurry after him.

“You want the window, yeah?” Seabs says, even as he drops his stuff on the bed nearest to the bathroom.

“Thanks,” Duncan says.

He remembers the first time he and Seabs were in a hotel room together; he’d had to jerk off after watching Seabs and Sharpy wrestle on the floor. He wishes he could say for sure that he wasn’t going to need to do so again at all over the next few weeks.

“So um, do you think we’ll have time to unpack before dinner?” Seabs asks.

“Maybe,” Duncan shrugs. “But I should probably get a change of clothes out, so I don’t smell like airport.”

“You don’t smell like airport,” Seabs says. Then he pauses, “Or maybe I just smell like it too and can’t tell.”

“Eau de recycled air.”

Seabs cracks a smile and starts going through his own bag, and they settle into a quiet rhythm before Seabs’s phone buzzes.

“Lobby in fifteen,” he reads off.

There’s about fifteen guys in the lobby and Duncan knows them all from either Rockford, prospect camp or last year’s training camp.

He breaks away from Seabs and heads for some of the guys who’d been called up from Rockford the previous year.

“So which one of you is picking up the tab?” Duncan asks. “Since you’re making the big bucks now.”

“Keith, you’re even crazier than everyone thinks if you think I’m paying for these animals,” Rob says.

Smith snorts in agreement.

“Jackie boy!” Seabs says, coming up from behind Duncan and quickly beginning an elaborate handshake with Duncan’s old roommate.

“Oh shit, Seabrook, the rumors are true!” Jack laughs.

“You two know each other?” Duncan asks, feeling a little lost.

“World Juniors! Gold Medal brothers,” Jack says laughing.

“You don’t remember the entire roster?” Smith asks. “I thought that was a citizenship test.”

“I was kind of sick through that tournament,” Duncan explains. “It was hard to watch.”

That’s mostly true. After Canada’s second game CBC had done a little two minute profile on Seabs and Duncan had spent the next two weeks convincing himself to do the right thing. He lost five pounds during that break. His coach had been baffled when they got back to school.

Seabs is very pointedly not looking at him, which is good, fine, whatever.

“We were fucking awesome, weren’t we pumpkin?” Seabs says to Jack.

“It was too much to hope you’d dropped that, wasn’t it?”

“So where are we going to eat?” Duncan asks, maybe a little too loudly.

Seabs sits at a different table than Duncan when they finally get enough room at the restaurant. It’s fine with Duncs, they’re already rooming together and it’s not like Seabs doesn’t have other friends on the team.

Still, somehow from two tables away Seabs catches him checking out one of the waiters when he clears their bread plates. Duncs reaches quickly for his water and tries to focus on the conversation at the table.

He’s pretty sure Seabs is the only one that noticed, and at least Duncan knows he doesn’t care.

Still, he makes a point of smiling at the pretty waitress, too, just in case anyone else is watching.
Seabs is quiet and trying to pretend like he isn’t annoyed about something when they get back to their hotel room. Duncan assumes someone insulted Brad Paisley or something and doesn’t press. It’s not his job to make sure Seabs is happy.

It’s still fairly early, so Duncan pulls out a book, but Seabs crawls into bed, not even bothering with the TV. He turns the lights off on his side of the room, but does that passive aggressive huffing as he rolls to face away from Duncan’s lamp.

On principal, Duncan reads ten minutes longer than he was planning on before turning off the light.

Fortunately, Seabs’s weirdness doesn’t last through until morning. They’re all too excited and distracted by the prospect of heading to the arena – a real, NHL arena – for a meeting before they hit the practice rink down the block.

The Ice House isn’t the United Center, but there are still more fans and reporters than Duncan has ever seen at one of his practices before.

Training camp is a lot like last year’s, a lot of the same faces, same coaches, similar drills and systems for practicing during scrimmages. There are a few differences though, Duncan is less nervous and awed than he was last year. He’s more comfortable in his practice jersey and can tell which guys were just drafted or have been playing in college or the CHL just by looking at them.

And Seabs is here. Playing with him is so easy, even with less than two months of actual playing time together. Duncan’s glad his unfortunate hyper awareness of where he is at any given moment is finally doing some good.

Quennville mixes up the pairings a lot, but it’s still not a surprise when the day before their first exhibition game against the Stars he says, “Keith, Seabrook, you two are gonna go tomorrow night.”

They share a look, and nod. They can do this.

“It’s not like we’ll be playing that many of the Dallas Stars,” Duncan points out, as they try to calm down enough to nap before the game. “It’s going to be a lot of the same guys we saw in Austin.”

“It’s going to be on TV,” Seabs says.

“IceHogs games are on TV,” Duncan points out. Channel 57, and not in high def, but they’re on TV.

He can practically hear Seabs’s eyes rolling. “Take your nap.”

The game is a shoot out, a 6-5 win for the Hawks, and the defense doesn’t exactly shine for either team, but Duncan gets an assist on the power play and that almost makes up for the minus two.

He’s still running high on adrenaline after the game, but after grabbing a beer with some of the guys in the hotel bar, he’s wiped out and heads up to the room. He feels a lot less lame when Seabs follows fifteen minutes later as Duncan finishes brushing his teeth.

“You look like shit,” Seabs says genially as they trade places in the bathroom.

“Fuck off,” Duncan says, turning the lights off on him.

Seabs yelps and Duncan grins as he crawls into bed. He’s asleep before Seabs finishes in the bathroom.

He wakes up some time later, his bladder full and insistent that he wake up and deal with it immediately. He stumbles to the bathroom, not bothering to even open his eyes fully. It’s not like he needs to be awake to do this.

He pisses on autopilot in the dark, and then heads back to bed, nearly tripping over someone’s shoes in the process. Duncan catches himself on the wall and glares before shuffling over to the bed. Seabs is sprawled out and hogging most of the mattress, but that’s no surprise. Duncan knows how to fight for his share.

He reaches for the covers, but is confused when they’re still mostly tucked in under the mattress. Duncan’s got them half pulled out when he realizes what he’s doing and he backs off so quickly that he slams into the wall. He freezes, praying the noise doesn’t wake Seabs and that he can just get back to bed without him realizing what Duncan almost did.

Jesus.

Seabs rolls towards Duncs but doesn’t actually wake up, letting him escape to his own bed. His own, separate bed.

He can’t go right back to sleep because his brain now fully awake and supplying him with horrifying and embarrassing “what if?” type situations.

What if Seabs had woken up while Duncan was trying to get into his bed? Would he have known it was an accident? Would he have cared?

Or what if Seabs had slept through it and Duncan hadn’t realized what he was doing was wrong? That would have made for an awkward morning.

But, Duncan admits, some really nice sleeping. Better than the last time they shared Seabs’s Twin-XL in Ann Arbor.

He rolls to face the window and tries to relax.

It was a mistake. He’s just tired, and it’s not likely to happen again, if only because they could be cut tomorrow and sent back to Rockford. That thought isn’t particularly calming.

But even if neither of them are cut, there’s only another week left in the preseason and then the training camp rooming assignments will be done with. Duncan can handle another few days.

Practice is light the next afternoon for the guys that played, and Coach Q sets the roster for the game the next night. Duncan isn’t on it, and neither is Seabs.

It makes sense, there are plenty of guys they want to look at, it doesn’t necessarily mean anything else.

“Maybe they don’t want to tire us out too early,” Seabs says as they grab protein bars from the table outside the locker room.

“Maybe,” Duncan agrees.

Seabs shrugs and breaks off to go talk to Snell and Johnson, leaving Duncan alone to mull it all over.

“Keith, Seabrook,” the trainer calls out. “Bowman wants to see you.”

It can’t be a good sign. Well, it could be, but it probably isn’t.

Rockford’s not that bad, he reminds himself, he’ll have his own place and you never know what’s going to happen over the course of a season.

“Breathe,” Seabs says, elbowing him gently as they head up to Bowman’s office.

“Duncan, Brent, please have a seat,” Bowman says, gesturing to two of the chairs in front of his desk.

Duncan doesn’t actually want to sit down, but he has no reason to insist on standing, so he sits and tries to stay still. Seabs’s leg is bouncing, but it’s below the top of the desk, so Bowman probably can’t see it.

“I just want to say what a thrill it is to have the two of you playing for the organization,” he begins and the rest of his words wash over Duncan as he waits to hear the inevitable.

Rockford’s not so bad, really.

“-and we’re looking forward to seeing what the two of you can do for the Blackhawks this year.”

Duncan doesn’t gape, but that’s only because he isn’t sure he can move. Seabs isn’t having that problem though, his smile takes over his whole face and he slaps Duncan on the back and reaches out to shake Bowman’s hand. Duncan finally remembers to do the same.

“Thank you,” Duncan says. “I- thank you.”

“No need, just go out there and play like we know you can,” Bowman says. “Now we’ll be looking to get you boys settled in the city as soon as possible, I know living out of a hotel isn’t much fun.”

He has no idea. Duncan almost melts with relief – he doesn’t have to share with Seabs anymore. There won’t be any more close calls like last night.

“I’ve been talking with Joel and the staff in Rockford, and we think it’d be best if the two of you shared a place this year. Normally rookies stay with one of the older guys, but we think it’d be best for your development if you two spent time getting to know each other and the city.”

Duncan has to school his features into something bland and unconcerned, even as he wonders what exactly he did to deserve this. Well. He knows what he did, but it’s still a cruel joke.

“How does that sound to the two of you?” Bowman asks.

Terrible, Duncan can’t say. He can’t explain that it’s an awful idea, because they used to date and sometimes Duncan thinks sharing a locker room is pushing the limits of his sanity. He’s not sure he’ll be able to survive the year in the same apartment.

“Sounds great,” he years himself say.

Out of the corner of his eye he sees Seabs shoot him a look, but Duncan keeps his attention on Bowman.

“Excellent,” Bowman smiles. “We’ll get you two set up with a realtor soon.”

“Great,” Duncan says.

“Thanks again,” Seabs finally says.

“So who are you going to call first?” Duncan asks, breaking the long weird silence as they head back down to the locker room.

“Huh? Oh, my parents, probably,” Seabs says.

Duncan doesn’t need to be a Seabs expert to tell that he’s not particularly thrilled by the idea of living together – for obvious reasons – so he grabs Seabs’s arm and pulls him to a stop next to a pile of gear.

“Listen,” he begins, “I know the living arrangements aren’t exactly ideal, but it’s only for a year, and whatever it takes to make the big show, right?”

“Whatever it takes,” Seabs echoes.

Duncan hopes he doesn’t visibly flinch, and just keeps talking. “We’ll find a place where we can stay out of each others’ hair and it’ll be fine. It’s only for one season.” Nine months at the max if they get lucky.

“Yeah, sure,” Seabs says.

“Okay,” Duncs says.

“You gonna let me go now?” Seabs asks.

He hadn’t realized he was still holding on to Seabs’s arm. It’s more defined than it used to be, Duncan notices. “Oh. Right, sorry.” He lets go and steps away.

“Right, so, I’m gonna call my folks.”

“Yeah, me too,” he agrees quickly.

“We have an appointment with a realtor the day after tomorrow,” Duncan says, lifting his beer to his mouth.

Sharpy inhales through his teeth and reaches out to pat Duncs on the shoulder. “That’s rough, buddy. You gonna be okay?”

“It’ll be better than sharing a hotel room. We’ll have our own rooms, bathrooms. Really it’s just the kitchen and the living room. It’s not a big deal.”

“Right, yeah, just fifty percent of the living area,” Sharpy says, signaling the bartender for another round. “You can’t hide in your room all season.”

“I won’t,” Duncan says sullenly. He’s still going to try to make an argument for the bigger bedroom, if they aren’t the same size. Just in case.

“Have you tried talking to him?”

“And say what?” Duncan asks. He then lowers his voice, though he doubts anyone in this Philadelphia bar recognizes them. “Sorry about dumping you a week after World Juniors? I know it’s been a year and a half, but I was hoping-”

He cuts himself off. “It doesn’t matter, even if we’re living twenty feet instead of twenty states apart the rest of it’s still true. It’s too risky, even if he did want to.”

Sharpy pays the bartender as he drops off another pair of Yuenglings. Duncan was supposed to be buying tonight, since they lost the exhibition game, but Sharpy’s forgotten about that.

“It’s getting better though, right? I mean, if guys like Avery can lobby-”

“Lobbying’s not the same as coming out and saying…”

“But maybe in a season or two?”

Duncan doubts it’ll be that soon, but even if. “By then Seabs will probably be married to some pretty blonde he can take to parties and bars and not have to worry about assholes trying to make trouble.”

He finishes his beer and reaches for the new one. “Hell, I don’t mean to be a downer. You were pretty okay out there tonight. You think you’ll stay up for the whole season this time?”

“I hope so,” Sharpy says, letting the subject change without comment. “Did you hear about the Islanders?”

There’s a glass of water on Duncan’s side of the night stand when he wakes up the next morning, which means that he wasn’t as quiet as he’d thought he’d been coming in the night before, but Seabs isn’t pissed or anything.

The shower shuts off as Duncan drains the glass, which is good, he’ll have a chance to hop in there before the team breakfast.

Seabs smirks at him when they switch places, but doesn’t actually try to engage in conversation, thank god.

Of course, the cost of his consideration comes once they’ve sat down to breakfast with the rest of the team.

“So how is Hot Stuff?” Seabs asks casually as Duncan grabs a piece of toast.

“Hot Stuff?” Rob asks from the other side of the table. “Did you get some action last night?”

“Sharpy’s doing well, he said to thank you for that pylon impression in the second period.”

Seabs’s mouth drops open in outrage. “I wasn’t a pylon.”

“Patrick Sharp?” Nordy asks. “Hot Stuff? Really Seabs, you shouldn’t get our hopes up like that.”

“He’s got an inferiority complex,” Duncan explains. “Just can’t handle Sharpy being prettier than him.”

He’s treading on shaky ground, but Seabs started it.

“He does have nice eyes,” Rob concedes.

“Sharp’s a fucking dreamboat,” Ollie grumbles.

“Yeah,” Murph chimes in, “if I were a chick, I’d do him.”

Duncan’s spent most of his life playing hockey, but he’s still surprised at just how gay conversations can get sometimes.

He sits there dumbfounded as the conversation turns to ranking who at the table would be the most fuckable, if there was some weird sci-fi thing happening.

“Come on Duncs, help me out, wouldn’t you want a piece of this?” Johnson asks, grinning widely to show off his missing teeth.

“Yeah, who would you go for?” Rob asks.

He can’t help glancing briefly at Seabs who is watching him expectantly. “Why am I limited to you fuckers? I’ve got Sharpy on speed dial.”

That gets a round of laughs from most of the table, but Seabs starts attacking his omelet with a vengeance.

The subject changes soon after, which is just fine with Duncan, it means he can hyperventilate in peace.

The meeting with the realtor the next day is a marathon of awkwardness. They’d mostly recovered from yesterday’s breakfast by the time they boarded the plane back to Chicago, and practice was fine.

But now as they drive around in Laurie’s alarmingly clean Lexus it starts to feel like some sort of bizarre purgatory.

“Have you two discussed what neighborhoods you’d like to start looking at first? Or any preferences on what you’d like in your building?”

“Um,” Seabs glances back at Duncan. “Not really, we’re both new to the city, so…”

“A balcony might be nice?” Duncan tries.

“And not too far from the UC.”

“Excellent, I’ve got a few properties in mind for the two of you, so we’ll start there.”

Duncan nods even though she can’t see him and stares out the window at buildings that are starting to look familiar.

He wonders if Seabs feels like they’re being treated like a couple. His casual use of ‘we’ without explicitly checking with Duncs is just adding to the strangeness.

It’s not that he needed to check with Duncan or anything, and Seabs has always been the chattier one so it makes sense, it’s just familiar, and that’s weird.

Neither of them like the new condo in the loop. It’s big, and it’s nice it’s just…

“Too sterile,” Seabs says after bumping into a glass table.

“Yeah,” Duncan agrees. He’s not sure he could ever really relax in a place like this.

They visit a few other places, none of them really stand out to either of them before winding up in a high rise on the edge of Lincoln Park.

“It’s a little further from the arena,” Laurie says, “but I think it’s more your style.”

It’s a newer building, but it actually looks like a place where people live, and they’ve got a great view of the lake.

“A bit bigger than Okanagan, eh?” Seabs asks.

Duncan is a little startled, he thought Seabs was checking out the bedrooms with Laurie. “Yeah,” he finally says. “It’s pretty.”

“Yeah,” Seabs agrees. “Listen, Dunc-”

Laurie calls for them down the hall, cutting Seabs off.

“I guess we should finish the tour.”

Neither of the bedrooms or bathrooms are obviously flawed, so when Laurie asks if they’re ready to visit the next place, Seabs stops her.

“I don’t think we need to. Dunc?”

“We’ll take this one,” he agrees.

“Excellent!” Laurie chirps. “I have to say, this has been one of the smoothest processes I’ve had with guys from your organization. You two are just going to love it here.”

Duncan smiles tightly, and glances back out the window, where someone is playing fetch with a black dog down in the park. “Yeah.”

“For sure,” Seabs agrees.

They sign the papers and get some furniture in the place between the end of the preseason and the season opener. Boxes from BC show up before the home opener, but there’s no time to unpack because there are interviews, and new suits and hockey.

And fans. A lot of fans.

They cheer loudly when Duncan’s name is announced for the first time at the UC, like they have any idea who he is. He’s trying not to fidget too much through the anthem, which is loud, really loud. Even compared to the preseason.

It’s a relief when the game actually starts and he can focus on the hockey and tune out everything else.

Most of his minutes are with Seabs, but he gets some with Johnson and Murph, too, and manages to avoid fucking up terribly to help the Hawks get their win.

They have to go out and celebrate, and even Duncan isn’t going to say no, not their first night out as actual members of the team.

Two hours later, he’s regretting that decision, as Seabs slips out of the bar with his hand resting low on the back of a woman who is wearing shoes that could double as weapons.

He stays a while longer, so it doesn’t look like he’s leaving in a fit. He doubts that anyone is paying attention to him, but it he doesn’t want to attract too much attention.

He’s answering texts from Becky and Cam while he opens the door to their apartment, so it takes him a minute to realize what he’s hearing.

Duncan saw Seabs leaving with that woman – he knew why they were leaving together but he hadn’t considered that they’d be coming back here, or that he would have to listen –

Seabs is louder than he remembers, but the last time they had sex, it was in the dorms at U of M. Apparently he’s loosened up a little since then.

He should go to his room and put on his new noise canceling headphones and just sleep and pretend it doesn’t bother him. But he can’t.

He can’t stay here.

Duncan considers calling a cab once he gets back downstairs, but he doesn’t know where he’d tell it to take him, so he just starts walking. It’s still nice enough out, even with the breeze off the lake. It’s after two am so most of the bars are closed, but there are still groups of people wandering the streets. He just shoves his hands in his pockets and tries to look like someone who wants to be left alone.

Eventually he finds an all night diner that isn’t too full of college kids, and orders enough cups of coffee and the occasional food item to keep the waiter busy. He tries not to mope and think about anything else, but by the time four am rolls around it’s just no use.

That should be him back there touching Seabs, seeing what noises he could draw out of him with no one else in the apartment, making him sweat and moan and then doing it all over again.

But he doesn’t get to do that anymore, not after what he did after the last time they were together.

He should’ve done this at the beginning of the weekend, instead of dragging it out the whole time, but he wanted a chance to say good bye. He knows he’s freaking Seabs out a little, by being so weird, and he’s doubting his decision every second that he’s here and Brent is smiling at him.

“So I’ll call you when I get to Syracuse,” he says as Duncan repacks his duffel bag.

He takes a deep breath. “I don’t think that’s really necessary.”

Brent laughs, “I know you won’t think I’ve died on the bus if I don’t like my mom will, so I’ll call you second.”

“No, I mean. I don’t think you should,” he braces himself, like he would for an incoming hit. “I don’t think we should do this anymore.”

“Do what?” Seabs asks. He’s not getting it and it’s killing Duncan. He had no idea this was coming.

“This. Us. You don’t really think us being in different states is going to make for a rock solid relationship, do you? I don’t see you enough as it is and it’s only an hour drive between Ann Arbor and East Lansing.”

“Syracuse isn’t that far- Dunc,” Brent protests.

“But in a few months I’m probably going to Rockford-”

“We’ll play each other!”

“What, twice a year? Be realistic. And then if you go out to California. It’s better to do this now, we shouldn’t drag it out. Neither of us can afford that kind of a distraction.”

“But I love you,” Seabs says. Duncan can barely look at him, because he looks like he’s going to cry, or hit something and all Duncan wants to do is apologize and make it better.

“I need hockey,” he forces himself to say. “I don’t know who I am without it. And I can’t risk messing up my game because I’m stressing about a long distance relationship.” Or what might happen if someone found them out.

He can’t say that part out loud, because Seabs would figure him out in an instant, they’ve had that fight too many times.

“Duncan-”

“I should get going, I have homework I need to do when I get back.”

“Dunc, wait.”

“Good luck in Syracuse.”

The diner he had to stop at just outside of Ann Arbor to get himself together had had better coffee than this. Of course, it had been the middle of the afternoon, not, shit, four in the morning. He should go home. There’s no way they’re still going.

The apartment is dark and quiet when he lets himself in for the second time that night, a welcome change. He finally lets himself feel the exhaustion he was fighting off in the cab as he falls into bed. The pregame ceremony feels like it was days ago, but he’s dead to the world before he can calculate exactly how many hours have passed.

There’s coffee brewing in the pot when he finally gets up the next morning, and Seabs is already dressed when Duncan goes shuffling past him. As far as he can tell, they’re the only two in the apartment.

“Hey, didn’t hear you come in last night.”

“Was out late,” Duncan grunts.

“You have fun with the guys?”

He shrugs. “Went exploring.”

“Oh. Cool,” Seabs says. “I guess I’ll leave you to your coffee then.”

Duncan waves at him and pulls up a chair next to the coffee maker so he won’t have to travel too far for his next cup.

The rest of the day is mostly a waste, but Duncs makes a point to unpack more of his stuff, because it means he’s not just sulking in his room between naps. Which isn’t to say that he’s not sulking, but at least that’s not all he’s doing.

When he digs an old Michigan sweatshirt out of a duffel bag Duncan feels pretty pathetic. Especially when he still, even after last night, wants to pull it on over his shirt and pretend it still smells like Seabs. He just holds it, and stares at it for a minute before shoving it under his pillow. It’s probably not much better than wearing it, but at least Seabs won’t accidentally see him in it.

He doesn’t see much of Seabs until they’re leaving for practice the next morning. Duncan is waiting for him by the door, and Seabs hesitates by the closet with their coats, licking his lip like he’s about to say something. But if it’s something that he’s nervous about saying or feels awkward about, it’s probably about the night before, and Duncan really doesn’t want to hear it.

“Ready to go?”

“Uh, yeah,” Seabs says, glancing around. “You got the keys?”

Duncan just holds them up and opens the door out to the hall. Talking about things would just make it all worse.

After Seabs brings home different girls each of the next three weekends they’re at home, and does god knows what in the bathroom of a bar in Los Angeles, Duncan is really glad they didn’t have a talk. At least this way he didn’t have to look Seabs in the eye and pretend like he doesn’t care and tacitly endorse it. Not that Seabs needs his permission, and he obviously doesn’t think so, so they really didn’t need to talk.

Besides, Seabs’s dates have given Duncan more time to hang out with his teammates. Whenever Seabs leaves the bar early, Duncan does his best to close it down with Jack or Rob or who ever’s still up. It’s better than sulking over bad coffee, and it’s good for the team.

“You never partied like this in Rockford,” Jack says, one night shortly before last call.

Duncan doesn’t really think trading ‘the worst penalty I ever took’ stories in a dimly lit bar counts as partying, but he gets what Jack is saying. Still he shrugs, “Bars weren’t as much fun in Rockford.”

That gets a laugh from everyone at the table and he’s pretty sure he’s slowly shedding the team weirdo label. Or at least none of these guys are going to give him serious shit for it. So really, it’s not so bad, this arrangement he and Seabs have.

He’s noticed that if he lingers outside the bar while Rob debates borrowing a cigarette from a guy down the block before catching a cab back home, Seabs and his hook up are usually done by the time he gets there, or are doing it all very quietly. Duncan appreciates it, because really, it’s the least Seabs can do.

But once when he decides to stay home rather than go out, he’s nearly asleep when he hears Seabs and the click-click of heels on hardwood. Whoever she is laughs, and Seabs shushes her, “My roommate’s asleep.”

And Duncan tries to sleep, he really does, during the lull in audible action as they turn into Seabs’s room. But it’s just not enough time before he can pick out the thumps and sighs and moans coming from the adjacent room. And fuck his fucking dick, because it can’t just ignore the sounds Seabs is making, because Seabs sounding like that meant so many good things for Duncan and his dick for so long.

He tries to ignore it, and the sounds, but he can’t help trying to picture what Seabs is doing that’s making him sound like that. Did she find one of those spots that turns him from big strong athlete to a malleable ball of mush that can just be pushed around as needed? Or is she blowing him, and does Seabs still like to bury his hands in Duncan’s- her. Her hair.

Duncan bites down hard on his lip. Maybe, maybe if he just jerks off and gets it over with, he’ll be able to ignore it all and just go to sleep. He could go to the bathroom, but one of them might hear and realize he’s awake and try to be more quiet, and even if they didn’t, he wouldn’t be able to hear as well in the bathroom and, he hates himself when he admits it but, he kind of wants to hear. It will certainly speed things along.

The woman gets noisier than Seabs as Duncan pulls the lube from the bedside table, but he doesn’t really mind, he knows how enthusiastic Seabs can be. He’s probably not on his knees for her, which is a shame, really, because it’s a good look, and if she’s like most of the girls that hang around with the team at bars, he could probably keep her upright with one hand, no matter what the other one and his tongue might be doing.

His hips jerk at that thought, and he lifts himself enough that his free hand can tease his ass just a little, not even pushing in, but just being there and it’s enough to push him over the edge.

Duncan’s pretty sure that whatever noises he might’ve made were covered by the ones they’re making next door.

As the endorphins fade, reality comes rushing back in. Fuck, he’d dealt with the fact that Seabs still stars in ninety percent of his fantasies, even if it is awkward now that they live together. But fantasizing about Seabs, or getting off to a memory is one thing, it’s an entirely different creepy and pathetic kettle of fish to get off to the sounds of Seabs fucking someone else next door.

He pulls out his headphones, like he should have the second they came home, and puts the volume up loud enough to drown them out. It’s not easy to fall asleep that way, but eventually he manages.

The circus kicks them out of the United Center for two weeks a couple of days later, and Duncan is so grateful. Seabs didn’t act like he’d noticed anything, and Duncan played it cool enough despite feeling incredibly guilty, but two weeks on the road means two weeks of rooming with Jack instead of Seabs and not having to pay attention to or over hear his post game activities.

It doesn’t mean he doesn’t notice the way women make a point to brush against him, or the way Seabs makes them laugh with some dumb joke - Duncan assumes it’s dumb, because Seabs doesn’t like good ones - or the way tugging on a lock of hair is still a big part of his flirting repertoire.

Duncan briefly considers getting a hair cut while in Edmonton, but remembers in time that he looks like a total dork with short hair.

Vancouver means dinner with his family and then drinks with Ryan, and it’s only after agreeing to a time and place that he realizes Seabs is probably invited, too.

It’s good to see his parents, and even Cameron has made it back out to see him play, which is great, and it’s just nice to have some family time for a few hours.

Until, of course, his mom asks, “So what else are you going to do while you’re in town?”

“Meeting Kesler for drinks later,” he says.

“Oh that’s nice,” she says. “He’s doing very well this season. Tell him we say hello.”

“Will do,” Duncan nods.

He’s trying to stay relaxed and not stress about it, it’s not like they don’t go out together with the guys all the time.

Becky picks up on it, and can’t leave well enough alone. “So just you and Kesler?”

He glares at her. “No, Seabs is probably coming, too.”

“Ah,” his dad says.

“I’m glad you two are friends again,” his mom says.

“Yeah,” Duncs agrees, even though he’s not sure that’s the right word for whatever they are now.

“I could go with you,” Becky points out, and then drops her voice, “Run interference.”

Great, his baby sister thinks he needs protecting. “No, you couldn’t. It’ll be fine.” He should maybe sound more enthusiastic. “It’ll be great.”

The bar Kesler picked is a shitty little dive that Duncan has been to once before.

“What, don’t they pay you?” Duncan asks, glancing at the two dollar Miller special advertised on a chalk board.

“You’re the one who told me about this place, you liked it.”

Duncan’s recommendation had more to do with what he and Seabs had gotten up to in the bathroom that night than the bar itself. But beer is beer, so he doesn’t make a fuss.

Kesler’s ribbing him about an edge he lost in Edmonton, and Duncs is trying to pay attention, and not catalog how the bar apparently hasn’t changed at all in two years, even the burnt out L in the LaBatt’s sign behind the bar.

Hopefully Seabs and Ladd still come here a lot, or Seabs doesn’t remember that night at all.

He almost jumps when Seabs shows up suddenly, like he heard Duncan thinking about him. “Jesus, Kesler, this place? I haven’t been here since before sophomore year.”

So much for that then. Duncan turns to look at the taps along the bar, like he’s trying to decide what to order.

“Well now you don’t have to stick to the Miller Light specials,” Kesler chirps. “Or if you two want to keep bitching about it, we could go somewhere that’ll charge you twice as much for a Molson.”

“It’s fine,” Duncan says. “I’ll get the first round.”

Duncan tries not to notice how Seabs looks a little strained when he gets back to the table. He’d want Seabs to do the same for him, and not make a huge deal out of it or anything.

It takes a couple of beers, but eventually they slip back into an almost easy conversation. Almost easy, because Duncan is trying his best not to care while Seabs calls Ryan ‘baby’ and flirts shamelessly. It’s not like it means anything, he does it with most of his friends and has for years. It took two weeks of Seabs calling Kes ‘pretty boy’ before he’d stop flinching. Now he doesn’t even blink when Seabs leers and asks him about his ‘stick handling’.

“Need some help in that department, Seabs?” Ryan asks with a smirk.

“From you? Always,” Seabs says, unable to keep the grin off his face.

It’s just stupid jokes, Ryan is stupid about Ladd and Seabs would never. Although Duncan kind of wonders what might’ve happened the summer before last- And no. He’s not going there.

“Maybe you should ask Datsyuk about his dangle?” Duncan chimes in.

That surprises a laugh out of Seabs but Kesler just rolls his eyes. “You two are terrible.”

“You love it, baby,” Seabs says.

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

“I gotta piss,” Duncan says, rising from the table.

The paint is still peeling under the harsh unshielded fluorescent bulbs, and there’s still a dent in the drywall. Seabs claimed it had been there before he shoved Duncs up against the wall and pinned him there, but it’s exactly at elbow height, so Duncan’s not too sure.

Christ, they’d been young and stupid and way too into public bathrooms for their own good.

The door swings open behind him, and Duncan half expects to see Seabs sneaking in to join him, but it’s just the old guy who’s been sitting at the bar all night.

He can’t wait to leave Vancouver.

They win in San Jose and that makes five points on the trip so far, so everyone’s in a pretty good mood, especially with the day off for Thanksgiving the next day.

“We should go out,” Jack says as the bus drops them back off at the hotel.

“For sure,” Rob agrees. They were all kind of wiped on their day off in Vancouver after three games in four days, but everyone is feeling buoyed tonight.

“We could go up to San Francisco.”

“Anyone know any good bars or clubs?”

Seabs laughs, “The only good bars I know you guys would be afraid to go into.”

“Fuck you, no we wouldn’t,” Jack protests. “Tell us where.”

“They’re all in the Castro,” Seabs shrugs. Duncan bites his tongue, because he wants to yell at Seabs for being stupid. “Some friends from Michigan came out for Pride last summer,” he continues.

“I’m not afraid of gay bars,” Jack scoffs. “My sister goes to them all the time, and fewer straight dudes means less competition.”

“I don’t know,” Rob hesitates.

“What, are you afraid none of the boys will think your pretty enough to hit on?”

“What, no!”

“I bet I get more drinks bought for me than you do.”

“No way.”

Duncan just watches this all take place in some kind of a weird haze. Like he’s not too sure he didn’t get hit on the head at some point during the game.

“You coming, Duncs?” Seabs asks.

“I, uh-”

“You can’t be any weirder in a gay bar than you are at a regular one,” Jack assures him, throwing an arm around his shoulder. “Way fewer chicks to scare off. It’ll be fun.”

It’s not actually that fun, at least not at first, because it’s a busy club and it’s loud. Seabs doesn’t mind, he hits the dance floor and has four people surrounding him almost immediately.

To their credit, Jack and Rob are very friendly with the crowd at the bar, and Duncan just shakes his head as Jack takes pictures with his admirers and send them to his girlfriend.

“Hey, I don’t think I’ve seen you in here before,” a guy says, coming up next to Duncan along the side of the bar.

“Oh. Um, no, first time,” Duncan finally answers. “From out of town.”

“Oh yeah? Where from?”

“Chicago.”

“They have names in Chicago?” the guy asks, his smile obviously teasing.

“Duncan,” he says, holding out his hand.

“Toby,” Toby offers. He stares at Duncan’s hand for a second, long enough for Duncs to consider pulling it back, before shaking it. “Are you here alone?”

He bites the inside of his cheek, considering. “I’m actually with that sideshow,” he says nodding towards Jack and Rob, and Seabs on the dance floor.

“Oh. Wow.”

“Yeah. No one looks too bothered, do they?” Duncan asks, surveying the group.

“They’re fine, the bartender will probably start bitching to me if it gets to be too much.”

“Thanks,” Duncan says. “So, um-”

“Why don’t I buy you a drink?”

Duncan is aware that Toby is kind of flirting with him, but he doesn’t seem to be working too hard at it, so he doesn’t feel like he has to explicitly turn him down.

Besides, he’s easy to talk to, and Duncan doesn’t want to be the loner weirdo in the corner not talking to anyone. He’s not bad to look at, either.

“So are you seeing anyone?” Toby asks, after Duncan buys their next round.

His eyes flick over to Seabs who’s sweating through his shirt on the dance floor. “No, not for a while.”

“Ah,” Toby says.

Duncan almost curses out loud. He’s not supposed to be so fucking obvious. Toby must see the panic on his face, because he reaches over and rests a hand on Duncan’s knee.

“Hey, it’s okay. I’d ask if you were military, but that’s over with, and well, your hair isn’t exactly regulation.”

“No, just. Our line of work isn’t the most queer friendly.”

“That blows,” Toby says sympathetically. “Or I guess the problem is it doesn’t.”

It’s a bad joke, but Duncan’s a sucker for them. “Yeah,” he says with a little laugh.

“Ugh, this calls for shots, my treat,” Toby says, waving the bartender over.

Duncan clinks his shot glass against Toby’s before knocking it back. The vodka is still burning his throat when he realizes Seabs has suddenly appeared next to him.

“Hey Duncs, do you mind if I finish this?” he asks, not really waiting for an answer before reaching between him and Toby to snag Duncs’s beer off the bar.

“You know that’s not the best way to rehydrate, right?” Duncan asks, trying not to stare at the way Seabs’s shirt is clinging to his everything.

“You know we’ve got tomorrow off?” Seabs asks, bumping Duncan as he puts the empty bottle back on the bar, and signaling for two more. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”

“Seabs, this is Toby, Toby, this is Seabs.”

“I’ve been keeping Duncan company while you were busting a few moves out there,” Toby says.

“I can see that,” Seabs says.

Duncan realizes Toby’s hand is still on his knee and can feel his face heating up. Seabs can’t really be mad about it, not when he’s been fucking girls in their apartment constantly.

“It looks like Rob and Jack are starting to fade,” Seabs continues, “so we should probably get going. Sorry Toby.”

“It’s no problem, I’ve got to head over to the East Bay early tomorrow,” Toby says easily. “But Duncan, let me give you my card, and maybe we can meet up the next time you’re in town.”

Duncan takes it, even though he can feel Seabs standing stiffly next to him the whole time.

He and Seabs abandon their beers on the bar to wrangle Jack and Rob, making sure their bar tabs are settled up and detaching them from their new friends before shoving them back in a cab that’s willing to make the trip down to San Jose.

Seabs takes the front seat, which is fine, because Duncan doesn’t want to spend the next hour pressed against his side as his sweat dries. He ends up sitting behind Seabs and spends the long ride back to the hotel counting the little flecks of glitter sticking to the back of his neck when a passing car’s headlight makes them shine.

They’re all a little cranky after losing in Anaheim, so Duncan is having a hard time telling if Seabs is still being weird after what happened in San Francisco or if he’s just tired of the road. He knows he’s being avoided either way, so he’s not sure whether or not he should be looking forward to going home.

They eke out a point in Los Angeles, and it’s better than a loss, supposedly, but Duncan doesn’t care. He’s just done with being on the road and barely makes it back into the apartment before sitting down on the couch and staring out the window. Chicago became home at some point over the past two months, and it’s kind of awesome.

“I never want to see another goddamn airplane ever again,” Seabs grumbles, kicking his duffel bag down the hall to his room.

“I hear the train is very nice,” Duncan says. He’s going to get up off the couch any second and go to his room. The cleaning lady has been by, which means he’ll have clean sheets on his bed, once he finally gets there.

“Ha. Ha,” Seabs calls back. It’s not a genuine laugh or anything, but he seems to have lightened up a bit.

Duncan still hasn’t moved when Seabs comes shuffling back out into living room and dropping down onto the recliner. Duncan glances at him, blinks and looks again. Seabs is wearing Duncan’s sweatshirt. Well, Seabs is wearing the Michigan sweatshirt Duncan’s had for the last two years, but at one point it was his.

“Does that even fit anymore?” Duncan asks as casually as possible. It’s tight across his shoulders, he doesn’t know how Seabs got it on. He just wants to take it back, but he can’t exactly rip it off him, or tell Seabs that he’s been keeping it the past few years.

“Barely,” Seabs shrugs. “I think it’s been living at the bottom of a bag for a while, I just found it in my laundry, but it’s still the softest thing I own.”

“Yeah,” Duncan agrees, but quickly adds, “All my State stuff is really worn in.”

He wonders if it’d be possible to steal it back, like maybe Seabs won’t notice it disappearing again for a while. But probably he will, now that he doesn’t have eighteen of them strewn across the floor of his room.

Duncan sighs and forces himself to look away, before he starts glaring at Seabs over something so stupid. He thinks it might be too late, so he needs to stop before Seabs catches him doing it.

“You okay, Duncs?” Seabs asks.

“Fine,” he snaps. “Just- just fucking tired.”

“Missed your nap today?”

Duncan glares at him, even though it’s true, be was playing cards on the plane instead of sleeping.

“I’m going to my room,” Duncan announces, finally standing.

“You do that,” Seabs says, kicking him as he passes.

It takes him a while to fall asleep without the hoodie balled up under his pillow, but he gets there eventually. He’s an adult. He plays in the NHL. He doesn’t need a security blanket.

About a week after they get back from California, Duncan’s old roommate from MSU comes to town with the Panthers and drags him out for a cup of coffee.

It’s good to catch up with Adam. They kind of lost touch after Duncan left for Rockford before the end of sophomore year, and they always got along well.

“-so really, Florida’s not so bad,” Adam says, draining his paper cup. “How about you?”

“I’m pretty good,” Duncan shrugs. “Getting minutes.”

“Man, I was so glad to hear that you and Seabs are living together.” Duncan’s brow furrows in confusion, but Adam just keeps talking, “I mean, just getting to play for the same team was awesome enough, but I could’ve told any other roommates that they might as well not bother.”

“I, um-” Duncan says, not entirely sure what words he should be trying to form, because he’s not quite sure if he knows what Adam is saying, and he doesn’t want to say anything he shouldn’t.

“It’s just good that you get to be happy, you know? Because you were a miserable fuck after winter break that year, Jesus. At first I thought it was just cause he went off to the A, but you didn’t spend nearly enough time on the phone.”

“Sorry,” Duncan mumbles, staring at his coffee. Adam can’t possibly be saying what Duncan thinks he is.

“Shit, I probably would’ve been worse if Jessica had dumped me,” Adam says. He glances down at his phone. “I’ve got to get back to the hotel, but I’ll see you on the ice, yeah?”

“Unless you’re scratched,” Duncs manages to chirp, despite the fact that he thinks he might pass out at any moment.

“Fuck you,” Adam says with a grin. “Say hi to Seabs for me.”

Duncan watches him leave, and has to ball his hands into fists until they start to cramp just to get them to stop shaking.

Adam knows about Duncan. He knows about Seabs. He knew about Duncs and Seabs and he didn’t ever say anything. He never asked to switch rooms. Duncan realizes that it probably wasn’t a coincidence that Adam spent the night in Jessica’s room most nights Seabs came to visit.

Jesus, he’d been so sure that he’d been keeping their secret so well, even from his roommate. But if he’d been wrong about Adam knowing, who else might know?

The thought makes his stomach turn, and he quickly stands to toss his cup and escape out into the cold air.

He wants to ask Seabs about it when he gets home, but he’s not sure how to ask, “Hey, did you know Adam knew we were fucking and didn’t care?” without it getting weird. And he hangs up before completing the call to Sharpy, because admitting that other people know about him, knew about him and Seabs. It feels like a failure. He fucked up.

He probably should tell Seabs, just so he knows that someone else knows, even though he always claimed he didn’t care.

He doesn’t do it before the game, because he doesn’t want to throw Seabs off, especially since he’s not sure how steady he’ll be. And after the game he’s just too tired for that kind of conversation.

There’s no good time to do it over the next few days, not even when Jack wonders aloud if his girlfriend will send him pictures of her with other girls for Christmas, since he sent her all of his on Thanksgiving.

And, okay, Duncan knows it’s stupid, but now that he knows that Adam knows, he half expects everyone else to know, too.

Of course they don’t, but on an overnight trip to Columbus he thinks maybe it wouldn’t be the end of the world if he told Jack. Just like, while watching the Daily Show in their hotel room, he could mention it casually.

Except he’s pretty sure it’d be anything but casual, since the idea makes him feel like he’s been skating suicides.

They play a game in New York, and Duncan finds himself pulling up a little when checking Sean Avery into the boards. Only a few times though, he’s not going to risk the game just because the guy is cool about the gay thing.

He kind of wishes he was on the Rangers, or no, he wishes Avery were a Blackhawk, because then maybe he could talk to him about this shit. As it is, he’s not really in the mood to dump on a guy he barely knows, especially not someone who’s kind of a dick.

“Don’t tell Avery,” Sharpy says over the phone a few nights later. “He’d make a way bigger deal out of it than you would want.”

“Yeah,” Duncan sighs. “I’ve just been thinking…”

“Thinking’s good,” Sharpy says. “Just, maybe try thinking about guys you know. Guys that aren’t assholes.”

“Yeah. I will.”

He can’t quite work up the nerve to say anything yet, but he stops trying so hard to look like he’s interested in the women that come around when he’s only out with a few of the guys.

He doubts anyone even notices, probably not even Seabs, but it feels good just the same.

So he’s in a pretty good mood when he comes home from dinner with Jack and Snell, who’s filling in while Johnson’s on the DL. He’s a little buzzed, and it’s just adding to his over all contentment.

He grabs a beer from the fridge and is headed out to the living room to watch catch up on the DVR when he hears laughter from the hallway outside their door keys jangling. Duncan would open the door for Seabs, but he’d rather see how long it takes him. The current record is about two minutes, the night he got his first NHL goal. He’d been too stubborn to let Duncan help him, even though Duncan had done far fewer shots.

It doesn’t take that long in the end, which is good, because they have practice the next day and Seabs probably shouldn’t be too hungover to follow the drills on the whiteboard.

But it’s not Seabs who comes in the door first. It’s not even a woman. It’s some guy in tight jeans and a half untucked shirt.

“Um, hi,” the stranger says. The skin on his neck is red and angry, and Duncan doesn’t have to guess why.

Seabs follows the guy in, and the top three buttons on his shirt are undone.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.” The words slip out before Duncan can stop them.

“I thought you were going out with Jack and Snells,” Seabs says.

“Yeah, to dinner,” Duncan answers in clipped tones. What was Seabs thinking? Picking up some guy in a bar is dumb enough, but apparently making out in the cab, and if the cabbie isn’t a hockey fan pushing it further by groping each other in the hall? The folks in 14B know exactly who they are.

To the guy’s credit, he looks super uncomfortable, but Duncan isn’t feeling very charitable at the moment. “Uh, maybe I should go-”

“No,” Seabs says quickly. “Stay.”

Duncan’s hand clenches around his beer. “Brent, you are not this fucking stupid.”

“Fuck you,” Seabs bites back.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go. Brent, uh, I’ll call you.” The guy, who isn’t even that hot, slips past Seabs and out the door they just came in.

“What the fuck was that?” Duncan asks.

“You’re one to talk. Fuck, Dunc,” Seabs’s jaw clenches. “It’s none of your business what I do, or who I do it with.”

“It is when you go splashing it around half the city! Should I check the Trib tomorrow to see if you and your friend made ‘About Last Night’?” Duncs can feel his voice rising and he slams his beer down on the end table. “You think your plus-4 is so important to the team that Wirtz might decide you’re to valuable to ship back to Rockford? Or down to Toledo?”

“You’re so fucking paranoid!” Seabs yells.

“Someone has to be, because you don’t think about it at all! You live in some idealistic bubble that has no relation with the real world or things like consequences. What if everyone found out? What if something happened to you? Do you even think about what that would mean for me?” He used to have nightmares about something happening to Seabs, but he was supposed to be safe now.

Seabs shakes his head. “Have you always been this self centered? Jesus.”

“You’re supposed to date girls.”

“What, you thought you were the only guy for me ever? You didn’t make me bi and you didn’t make me straight,” Seabs is starting to turn red and he’s punctuating every sentence by jabbing his finger at Duncs. “You don’t get to care what I do. You dumped me two years ago.”

“Because I fucking love you!” Duncan yells, grabbing Seabs’s wrist to get his hand out of his face.

He freezes when he realizes what he just said, and he feels like his stomach is going to drop the fourteen floors down to the sidewalk. But the next thing he knows, he and Seabs are kissing. He’s kissing Seabs.

And Seabs is pissed. He shoves Duncan back against the wall and pins him there, and Duncan’s entire world narrows down to Seabs’s lips and tongue and teeth and the weight of him. He’s going to have bruises from Seabs’s fingers and one of them might wind up with a bloody lip, but Duncan doesn’t care, because it’s Seabs.

He should stop him, and figure out why Seabs is doing this, but he’s not willing to do anything that might make Seabs reconsider. It’s been nearly two years since Seabs or anyone touched him like this and he needs it too much to stop.

Duncan is getting hard and he’s not being subtle about it, grinding his hips against Seabs and gasping at the friction. He lets go of Seabs long enough for Seabs to shove a hand down between them, and he can’t begin to fight the needy noise he makes when Seabs brushes his cock through his pants as he fights to get them open.

“You’re so fucking…” Seabs mumbles against Duncan’s neck. So fucking what? He’s not sure it would be a compliment so he doesn’t bother trying to form the words needed to ask.

“Seabs, Seabs, please,” he begs instead, as Seabs quickly finds spots on Duncan’s neck that Duncan had forgotten about. Ones that make his limbs jerk and his whole body shake.

He doesn’t tease, just shoves enough clothing out of the way so he can wrap his hand around Duncan’s dick. It’s rough and dry but not only is it not Duncan’s hand, it’s Seabs’s and in no time at all he’s bucking into his grip and just hanging on to Seabs as best he can as the orgasm hits.

Some of the anger seems to have bled out of Seabs, his shoulders are tense for an entirely different reason. “Fuck, Dunc,” he says, wiping off his hand and licking his lips. They’re red and swollen and Duncan has to kiss him again. He reaches for Seabs’s pants, but at the last second, he drops to his knees.

“Oh Jesus, Duncs,” Seabs bites out.

He’s a little rusty, but he’s counting on Seabs not being too critical. It helps that Duncan’s thought about this a lot since he last did it, and Seabs has learned a little more restraint since then. Girls he picks up in bars probably aren’t as forgiving if he starts pushing for more, Duncan thinks a little bitterly. He still tugs and pulls on Duncan’s hair though, especially the parts that curl behind his ears. It means he can’t quite hear whatever it is Seabs is babbling, but he doesn’t mind. He just wants to make this good.

“Fuck, Dunc. Duncs,” Seabs says insistently, tugging him back.

He backs off just enough so he won’t choke, but swallows everything he can, while Seabs shakes over him. Duncan’s impressed that he’s standing as well as he is.

Reality settles back in as Seabs zips back up and Duncan realizes he has no idea what the hell just happened.

He opens his mouth to say something, but nothing really comes to mind. He just wishes he knew what Seabs was thinking. It doesn’t get any less confusing when Seabs offers him a hand up and pulls him down the hall to Seabs’s bedroom. The longer either of them go without saying anything, the more Duncan feels like he can’t say anything, even as they strip down to their boxers and get into Seabs’s bed.

Seabs rolls away from Duncan, and he stares at the line of his back, wondering why the hell he’s even there. He knows himself well enough not to expect even a minor debate about getting up and going to bed alone.

He wakes up half on top of Seabs, and arm sprawled across his chest and his face nuzzled into his neck. Well, at least he can count on his subconscious to take an opportunity presented to him. He watches Seabs sleep for a while, until even he starts to feel a little bit creepy about it.

Seabs didn’t even want to look at him when he went to sleep last night, so Duncan’s face probably isn’t the first thing he wants to see when he wakes up. He forces himself up off of Seabs, trying not to wake him, and pulls the blankets up over him so he won’t get cold.

His beer is still on the table in the hall, so he trashes it and makes himself a cup of coffee before heading into his room to put on some clothes. It’s kind of early, but not so early that Sharpy can really complain, especially since he’s an hour ahead.

So he takes his phone and his coffee out onto the balcony, brushing snow off the wooden chair he keeps out there and settles in to make the call.

“I did something really stupid last night,” he says before Sharpy can even complain about the time.

“Well I’m going to assume you didn’t knock anyone up,” Sharpy says with a yawn.

“Sharpy.”

“Fine, right, yeah, what happened?”

Duncan stares at the steam rising off his mug. “I slept with Seabs.”

“Yeah? You two crazy kids worked it out?”

“No,” Duncan says. Whatever that was, it wasn’t working it out.

“Aw hell. How drunk were you?”

“Not very,” he admits. He takes a long sip of his coffee before sketching out what happened to Sharpy. “So maybe he just wanted to get laid, and I was there and…”

“He wouldn’t do that. And if he would, then he’s a bigger jackass than any of us realized and you dodged some major bullets by dumping him.”

“Yeah,” Duncan knows he’s right, but he’s still not sure what’s going on. Maybe it was just Seabs’s version of breakup sex.

“Go back to bed. His bed. Talk to each other,” Sharpy says. “Stop freezing out on the balcony.”

“It’s not that cold,” Duncan says, and he can practically hear Sharpy shaking his head at him before he hangs up. He does finish his coffee and head back inside, but he’s too awake to go back to sleep, in either bed, so he takes a shower instead.

Seabs doesn’t get up for a while. Duncan can’t tell if he’s just sleeping in or if he’s forgoing coffee to hide out in his room. He can’t really check, because if it’s the latter, that would just make things worse.

So he gets dressed, makes a couple of smoothies, and puts one in the fridge for Seabs, who emerges just before they have to leave for practice.

“Thanks,” Seabs says, grabbing the smoothie and his coat.

And that’s it. They drive to practice like it’s any other day, and Duncan’s stomach seems to harden into a rock. So that’s how it’s going to be. Well, at least he didn’t make an idiot out of himself by staying in Seabs’s bed this morning. It was nice while it lasted, but it’s over. Nothing’s really changed, they’re in the same place they were before last night.

He acts as normally as he can, because now is really not the time. Christmas is coming up soon, he can get good and drunk then. Again.

Practice goes well enough, but Duncan’s reflexes are just a split second too slow. He’s not sure if anyone else notices; Q gives him a few long looks, but doesn’t actually say anything. He has to get over this by the game tomorrow.

He hits the showers with the rest of the guys, and as they change back into street clothes, Jack whistles. “Wow, Duncs, where did you pick up a live one last night? You said you were just going home.”

“Oh, um-” Duncan says, his hand reaching up to a hickey left on his neck. The hot water always makes bruises look more intense.

“Apparently you’re the one that’s been salting his game,” Rob says. “It’s about time the boy got some action.”

“Three million people in this city, he finally found the one that’s into his shy nerd schtick,” Murph says, slapping Duncan on the shoulder.

He can’t look at Seabs. He absolutely cannot look at Seabs. (When he sneaks a glance, Seabs is pulling on a shirt, paying no attention to him.)

“Is this gonna be a regular thing?” Jack asks him.

“I. Um,” Duncan says.

“You ready to go, Duncs?” Seabs asks, saving him from having to answer.

“Uh, just a second,” he replies, quickly pulling on his shirt – it doesn’t hide the hickey at all – and reaching for his coat.

Seabs doesn’t really say anything in the car, but he lets Duncs pick the music since it’s not a game day. He’s tempted to go really metal, but ends up just picking AC/DC, and Bon Scott is the only one that says anything the entire drive home.

Seabs makes a sandwich in the kitchen before disappearing into his room, and Duncan tries not to mope too badly at being so thoroughly ignored. He goes to get something to eat himself, and realizes there’s a turkey sandwich with no tomatoes waiting for him on the counter. He stares at it for a minute, wondering if it’s a trick, not that he’s sure what kind of trick a sandwich could be.

Eventually he takes it back to his room to eat, and he spends more time than he’d like to admit trying to figure out what the sandwich means. Maybe it’s just payback for the smoothie this morning, but usually they just trade off who makes them, so that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

He falls asleep worrying that the sandwich wasn’t for him after all.

When he wakes up, it’s to the sound of the door slamming and a much darker sky. As his higher brain functions come back online, he realizes it smells like pizza. Duncan can’t remember the last time Seabs ordered a pizza sober. He can’t help going out to see why Seabs is suddenly risking the wrath of the nutritionist without empties set up as defense.

The box is sitting on the table, with two plates and two beers set out.

“Hey, I got dinner,” Seabs says easily, like it isn’t one of the first things he’s said to Duncs all day that wasn’t at the UC.

“Pizza. Feeling rebellious?” Duncan can act casual, too.

“Something like that,” Seabs says. That sounds ominous, but Duncan takes his seat anyway.

He’s had about two bites of pizza, triple sausage, before Seabs looks over at him and says, “So explain to me how exactly dumping me because you love me makes any goddamn sense?”

Duncan almost chokes on his beer, and Seabs just quirks a little smile at him.

“I- you-” Duncan starts. “I didn’t want to get you into trouble. Not because of me. You got featured on CBC and then what, three thousand people tried to add you on Facebook? I couldn’t. I didn’t.”

He’s probably not making any sense, and Seabs looks more than a little annoyed.

“So you figured I’d quit being gay if it wasn’t for you?”

Duncan cringes. “No, I just. You can be with women, I thought- I thought it’d be better for you.”

“You thought wrong. Fuck, Dunc,” his voice gets a little strained at the end. “You’re an asshole, you know that?”

Duncan shrugs, not quite meeting Seabs’s eye.

“I had a plan for us,” Seabs says. “If you would’ve just fucking talked to me-”

“I couldn’t,” Duncan says. “I could barely- It wasn’t easy. If I talked to you…” it wouldn’t have worked, he doesn’t say.

“I would’ve told you how stupid it was.”

“And your plan was foolproof?” Duncan snipes.

“Yes,” Seabs says. “We’d keep it on the down low for a few years, see if anyone else came out first, win some Stanley Cups, a Norris or two, maybe a few more gold medals, and no one would care when we finally got to come out together because we’d be fucking amazing hockey players and they’d be crazy not to want us on their team.”

“You really think you’ll win a Norris?” Duncan asks, like that’s the important part of what Seabs just said.

“Fuck you,” Seabs says easily. “You really thought I’d just get over you and start banging chicks like you didn’t matter at all?”

“Didn’t you?” Duncan’s not sure that the number of women he’s seen Seabs with could be counted on his hands.

Seabs just shakes his head, like Duncan said something completely ridiculous and not the least bit true, even though he did, and stands. For a brief second, Duncan thinks Seabs is going to walk out, or when he moves around the table to Duncan, hit him. He’s not expecting to get dragged up by his shirt front so Seabs can kiss him.

It’s better than last night, since they aren’t both angry at each other, and Seabs is just kissing him like he could do it for the next three days without coming up for air. “So fucking stupid,” Seabs mumbles.

“All those women,” Duncan replies, wrapping his hand around the back of Seabs’s neck. He doesn’t want to think about them, now.

“Weren’t you,” Seabs says, pressing his lips against the hickey he left last night.

“But-” Duncan gasps.

“No buts,” Seabs says. “I love you, you dumb fuck.”

It’s a lot less romantic than it was the first time Seabs ever said it, but Duncan almost likes it better. He laughs a little, and runs his hand through Seabs’s hair.

“You’re not going to try to pull this shit again, are you?”

“No,” Duncan says, tightening his arm around Seabs’s back. “I almost came out to Sean Avery last week.”

Now it’s Seabs’s turn to laugh, and it’s been way too long since Duncs got to be the one to make him look like that, so he has to kiss him again.

“I wanna get you naked,” Seabs says, pulling Duncan with him down the hall to Duncan’s room this time.

“And then I’m going to blow you,” Seabs says, “Jesus, do you know how long it’s been since I blew someone?”

“Just like riding a bike,” Duncan manages to say as Seabs throws him down on his bed. He’d object more to getting manhandled like this, but Seabs has put on at least fifteen or twenty pounds since they last did this and it’s fun, feeling what he can do now.

Duncan strips off his shirt while Seabs pulls down his sweats, apparently done with foreplay since Duncan obviously doesn’t need it. And wow, the sight of Seabs on his knees in front of him… Duncan had done his best to think about other things, other people while jerking off over the past couple years but it always came back to Seabs.

And now he’s here, stroking Duncan’s cock with one hand and licking his lips like he’s some kind of porn star or something. “Seabs, please,” Duncan begs. He needs this too badly.

Seabs grins up at him, looking a little nervous, which is just dumb, before he finally, finally wraps his lips around the head of Duncan’s cock. It takes every bit of stamina he has to hold back while Seabs slowly takes more of him into his mouth. The gasping, inarticulate noises Duncan is making while he holds onto Seabs’s head seem to give him enough confidence to really get going.

It’s wet and sloppy, like back in Duncan’s truck in high school, but occasionally Seabs will bust out a more advanced move and it’s all just fucking with the parts of Duncan’s brain that aren’t being sucked out through his dick.

“Fuck, Seabs, fuck,” Duncan moans. He’s not sure he knows any other words at the moment.

Seabs doesn’t mind, he’s getting more creative and Duncan’s not going to last a whole lot longer, not when his tongue is moving like that and his free hand is teasing his balls like that and slowly moving back.

He feels like his spine has been twisted into knots, and it’s almost a surprise when he finally lets go. “Seabs, I’m-” he gasps out a belated warning before coming into Seabs’s mouth and falling back against the mattress, since his arms can’t hold him up anymore.

He can hear Seabs coughing a little, and he feels bad until Seabs crawls up onto the bed with him laughing a little. “Probably not as good as the last guy who did that for you.”

“There were some strong similarities,” Duncan says, wiping at the wet spot at the corner of Seabs’s mouth.

Seabs’s eyebrows draw together in confusion, so Duncan has to clarify, “You were in mid-season form then.”

“Wait, no one? In two years, no one?”

Duncan shrugs and starts pushing at the waistband of Seabs’s sweats. “No one else seemed worth it.”

Seabs kisses him then, and even though he’d had plans for Seabs’s dick, Seabs won’t stop kissing Duncan long enough for him to use any of them, content to rub himself off on Duncan’s leg with his sweatpants around his knees while making out lazily. And not so lazily as things progress.

“It probably makes me a jackass,” Seabs says later, as they lie together, sweaty and sticky but not grossed out enough to move just yet. “But I’m kind of glad. That you didn’t. Kes said you were being a martyr, but I didn’t think-”

“You called Ryan?”

“You were messing with my head,” Seabs says. “I needed back up.”

Duncan debates whether or not he wants to know what exactly was said, and winds up on a more important question. “So I can cancel the security detail for Raleigh in February?”

Seabs laughs and Duncan can feel the way it moves through his chest. “I’ll guard your body, babe.”

Fuck, he missed Seabs’s stupid jokes and terrible puns so badly, and hadn’t even realized it until just now. He rolls them over, so he can pin Seabs to the bed and kiss him everywhere he can reach.

Seabs keeps looking over at him and smiling as they drive to the UC the next afternoon, like he can’t quite believe that this is happening again. Duncan doesn’t mind, he’s free to stare at Seabs the whole trip, since he’s not driving.

They get a little handsy while waiting at red lights, and as they turn on to Madison, Duncan has to say, “No making out in the players’ lot.” He’s not sure who he’s reminding.

“But you’re thinking about it,” Seabs says gleefully.

Duncan just squeezes his thigh in response.

No one comments on their changed moods from the day before, except Rob who says, “Worked shit out. Good.”

Duncan doesn’t bother to point out what a massive understatement that is.

By the middle of the second period, the game is pretty well in the bag and on its way to being a blow out. Jack has two assists and Duncan manages to pot a shortie, thanks to a ridiculous defensive breakdown by the Wild’s power play unit. The crowd is rocking and it’s awesome, Duncan can’t remember a better game than this one.

So it’s not really a surprise when one of the Wild’s fourth liners drops the gloves with Seabs. Duncan hesitates to call it a fight since Seabs just absolutely pummels the guy before he finally taps out.

“Someone had his Wheaties this morning,” Ollie announces to the bench.

Duncan’s barely paying attention because Seabs catches his eye as he’s escorted to the penalty box and just smirks. Duncan can’t believe there’s still twenty eight minutes left to play.

A shot blocked with his thigh on his very next shift keeps things pretty well under control
until Seabs comes back to the bench and leans over to ask, “Think that’s going to be a two beer bruise?”

“We’ll find out,” Duncan says. It wasn’t meant to sounds like a promise, but Seabs grins at him like it was.

There’s no getting out of going out for drinks with the team after a 6-1 blowout, unfortunately, and it doesn’t help when Seabs comes up behind him at the bar and leans over to place an order with the bartender.

“Very smooth,” Duncan says under his breath, even as he leans back against him.

“I got moves, babe.”

Seabs does a little wiggle, and Duncan absolutely does not blush, but he can’t help the little grin that stays in place while Seabs calls Jack over. “Sugarpie, it’s shots time!”

“To the shortie!” Jack cheers, both arms over his head.

Duncan’s grin grows as Seabs passes him his shot and keeps very deliberate eye contact while toasting and knocking it back. Duncan does the same, and just to make sure he’s not the only one feeling uncomfortable, he licks his lips to make sure he’s got all the alcohol.

Jack has to elbow Seabs to get his attention back to…whatever they’re talking about. “Jeez, Seabs, how many have you had?”

It only takes another round for Duncan to casually lead Seabs into the bathroom and pin him against the door so they can make out like teenagers. It’s stupid and risky but Duncan doesn’t care at all, he just needs to touch Seabs everywhere he can reach and work his knee in between between Seabs’s thighs just because he can.

“I should get into fights more often,” Seabs pants.

“When can we get out of here?”

Seabs swallows. “I’ll get a cab, you grab our coats. Just say bye to everyone, don’t get stuck in any conversation.”

Seabs kisses him again as Duncan tries to nod. He’s not sure he could say much anyway, so it shouldn’t be a problem. Seabs takes a second to fix Duncan’s hair before slipping out the door.

Duncan stays a second at the sink until his breathing returns to normal and his face is a more acceptable shade of red before following him out.

He keeps meaning to come out to Jack at least, but doesn’t get around to it until after the new year, when Sharpy comes to town with the Flyers and prods at him, after wrestling with Seabs on the floor of their living room, like the world’s most elaborate secret handshake.

Jack wants to check out the penguins at the Shedd and Duncan lets himself be dragged along, and well, it’s as good a time as any.

“Oh shit man, for real? Wait wait, let me guess, you and Sharp?”

Duncan laughs, a little hysterically, because whatever reaction he’d be expecting it wasn’t that. “No, no. He’s straight-”

“How bad were you dogging that at fifteen?”

“He wasn’t that great then,” Duncan protests. “He had braces.”

Jack snorts.

“By the time the braces came off and he didn’t have little chicken legs anymore… There was Seabs,” Duncan says the last part quickly, and watches the beluga whale turn in the water. Which means he’s not expecting the swift punch in the shoulder.

“You’re the son of a bitch that broke his heart!” Jack says accusingly. “The high school sweetheart he was so stupid over at World Juniors!”

“Yeah, well. I’m unbreaking it now,” Duncan says, rubbing at his arm. “Ow by the way, when did you become such a goon?”

“I’ve got hidden depths. No shit man, that’s awesome.”

“Yeah,” Duncan agrees. His reflection is grinning pretty stupidly.

They tour around to see the sea lions and otters before heading back downtown.

“I need to get you guys a cake or something,” Jack says, pulling up in front of Duncan’s building.

“It doesn’t need to be in the shape of dick,” Duncan says quickly.

“They do that?” Jack asks delightedly.

“I’ll see you later,” he says, bailing from the car.

When he gets inside, Seabs is sprawled out on the couch, faking casual about as well as his mom used to when he’d be out on a date. “So how’d it go?”

“Fine, he wants to get us a dick cake,” Duncan says, leaning down to kiss him.

Seabs laughs, “I told you.”

“He also thought I was sleeping with Sharpy,” Duncan adds, just to knock the smugness out of Seabs’s voice.

“Pfft, what would you want with someone like that when you can have all this?” Seabs asks, gesturing at his stunning outfit of sweat pants and sweatshirt.

“That’s my hoodie,” Duncan says.

“Oh, were you a Wolverine and I just missed you in the locker room all those years?” Seabs asks.

“You had it for like a month, I had it for three years,” Duncan says.

Seabs looks at him, confused for a second and then he grins wildly when he finally gets it. “Well if you want it back, you’re going to have to take it.”

Duncan can handle that.

Especially when the next morning, Seabs rolls into the kitchen wearing a pair of Spartan green sweatpants that are an inch too short.

Works inspired by this one:

- [Podfic of] Hide It Well by isweedan

Table of Contents

- Extra Curriculars by riadsala
- Nothing Worth Knowing by beatperfume
- The One About the Appendix by beatperfume
- Hide It Well by shoemaster